Ok, so I've admittedly been talking a little bit of crap about James Cameron's Avatar for a few months now. I haven't been totally against the film, mind you. It's just that I was getting annoyed with James Cameron talking about his film like it was the second coming of Christ or something of equally epic proportions. The trailers and commercials I'd seen for the film didn't look all that great to me, but there Cameron was, swearing up and down that his film would revolutionize the way films are made. I didn't buy it, but I was willing to keep an open mind and allow the possibility that he was telling the truth. This is afterall the guy who gave us Aliens and Terminator 2. Maybe it was all hype, but it was hype from a guy who made awesome films.
Having seen the film now though, I'm definitely one of the people who falls into the "it was all hype" category. That's not to say that Avatar is a bad film though. Far from it. It's a decent film with some major strong points, it's just not the filmmaking revolution that Cameron had promised, at least not as far as the story is concerned.
The big thing about this film of course are the 3D special effects, and yes I will gladly admit that they are as awesome as everyone keeps saying they are. The visuals in Avatar are absolutely breathtakingly beautiful. The CG in this film is gorgeous, and the use of IMAX 3D technology just helps to immerse the audience into the world of Avatar. The colors in this film are as lush as the artifical jungle that makes up the film's setting. Seeing the world of Pandora light up at night truly is a site to behold. Even the motion-capture tech used to create the blue skinned Navi is flawless. Yes, I still think that the aliens look like crossbreeds of Thunder Cats and Smurfs, but I will admit that the process used to bring them to the screen is so fluid that I stopped thinking about how goofy they looked after about 30 minutes into the film and was just able to enjoy the story instead of being distracted by the visuals.
However, it's when I started paying attention to the story that everything started falling apart for me. To say that Avatar's story is similiar to stuff we've seen before is a bit of an understatement. It's more accurate to say it's the exact same story we've seen a few times before, but now it's just set in space instead of the old west. I've personally taken to calling the film Space Pocahontas because that's basically what it is. I realize that Avatar actually has more in common with Dances With Wolves' storyline than it does Pocahontas, but Dances With Space Wolves just doesn't sound as awesome as Space Pocahontas, and the films are all similiar enough anyways that I don't think it matters. So, Space Pocahontas it is.
As for the story, it really is point by point the same as that of Pocahontas and Dances With Wolves. A member of the military from a highly technological society is sent far away from home to "a new world" where he meets an old native culture that is very spiritual and in touch with nature. Over the course of the film this character is introduced to their culture and ways and is slowly won over by them until the point that he is accepted into their society, but then his friends from his original culture threaten to destroy his newly adopted culture for one reason or another that has to do with territory or mining or something and he has to fight alongside his new family to defend their homeland and way of life. Oh, and there's a native girl that he falls in love with along the way which really is the main reason he changes sides. Sound familiar? Yeah, I can't tell which film I'm describing either.
Plot point by boring cliched plot point, Avatar drags along as if it were a "paint by numbers" film in which Cameron took some great moments from other films and smooshed them altogether to create one uber story that is the perfect epitome of stereotypical hollywood storytelling. Every twist and turn is completely predictable, and the outcome is pretty much known well before you get to the end of the film. The absolute worst moment for me was when they told us the name of the ore which they were mining on Pandora which was supposed to be the foundation of the whole film's story. It's called Unobtainium.
Yeah, I'll let that sink in for a second. Unobtanium.
That has got to be one of the worst things I've ever heard. That just screams to me lazy script writing. Why didn't Cameron just call it Macguffinite, or Reallyhardtogetesium. And just what does this Unobtainium do that's so god damned important that humans are willing to commit genocide to get it? I honestly don't know. It's never really explained in the script. Does it cure cancer? Does it power every city on planet Earth in a completely green friendly way? Can it grant wishes to whoever touches it? Who knows! All we know is that it's a rock, it's hard to find, and the Navi Villiage is sitting on top of a million pounds of the stuff. Sorry, but that isn't good enough for me. You can't just have a rock be the main driving force of your plot and not explain why it's so sought after.
That's just one of my problems with the story. The bigger reasons are things like the cookie cutter nature of good and evil that are represented in the film. I would have liked to have seen Sam Worthington's character actually have to make a difficult moral choice at some point about who he was going to side with, but when you have the completely peaceful and wonderful Native Americans, oops I mean Navi on one side and an evil Corporation/military on the other that is led by a Yosemite Sam style trigger happy gun nut, is it any wonder he chose some hot blue alien tail over the greedy money grubbing business men? Hmm, let's see, in one world he's a parapalegic former marine who doesn't have any friends or loved ones and in the other he's a strong and virile hunter who has a princess with the hots for him and he gets to fly around on these awesome dragon things. Which life would you choose? Be honest.
I realize that I'm probably asking for too much. Admittedly, as great as Cameron's previous works are, none of them have had amazingly written thought provoking stories. There wasn't exactly a lot of deep moral dilemmas in Aliens or T2 either, so why should I expect those here? What James Cameron is really good at is telling simple stories in cool and pretty ways where lots of things explode and generally look totally badass. That's what Avatar is really. Is it entertaining? Yes. Is it a groundbreaking moment for cinematic special effects? Absolutely! So let's just focus on those and be happy I guess.
A few quick comments of praise though before I wrap up this review. I really did like Zoe Saldana's performance in the film. Blue Thunder Smurf or not, she was a classic Cameron badass Sci-fi warrior woman just like Ripley or Sarah Connor. Speaking of Ripley, seeing Sigourney Weaver in a sci-fi film is always a treat, and this was no exception. Also, the idea that the whole planet of Pandora is an evolved and interconnected ecosystem in which an animal can link up with and sync with other animals or even with plants is a pretty cool damned concept. It's like a literal world wide web. It's just too bad that this concept wasn't developed further.
In the end, I do suggest that you go see Avatar. When you do though, be sure to pay the extra few bucks and see it on the IMAX in 3D. That really is the only way to see it. It's well worth it for the visuals alone. Just don't expect a lot from the plot and you'll be fine.
Final Grade: B
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