Film: Avatar

[grimble crumble]

Iwouldn't say the plot was unoriginal, just predictable. Having said that Titanic was a one way street and for some reason the public and critics lap that shit up.

I would still give it 4 stars solely due to the ability to be lost in that world. The 3D effect of walking through the planets undergrowth, flying through clouded mountains and alian sex scenes in a glowing forest meant I would have been happy just to wander around with zero plot for 3 hours and still feel like I got value for money.

I just know my mental scape has been crafted for the next Doof I plan to attend

agreed 100%

I could have stayed lost on pandora for an extra two more hours and been happy

 

[physix]

I mean, it really is Dances with Wolves meets Ferngully with a dash of O.Scott Card's Speaker of the Dead for good measure.

Despite all that, I enjoyed myself. See it in IMAX or don't see it at all.

 

[L2R]

the tree and the jellyfish are straight from miyazaki. mononoke hime is imitated with a fake heart and about one sixth of the plot. i was entertained for the whole runtime, despite the ultralame second half. the film peaks at around the 30% mark and then just goes limp. the plot and the dialogue then get really tired and so do the actors. sam worthington's accent seems to slip a number of times later on which i found funny. the culture of the aliens was fascinating at first, but then it got lamer and lamer.

the animation was very pretty. on imax it was incredibly clear. worth the ten bucks for admission, but i won't sit through it again. the name of the precious metal is unforgivably lame. how on earth did that stupid name end up selected. any nonsensical selection of sounds would have done much better.

3/5 for entertainment for one time only value.

 

[BlueFractal]

"unobtanium" is incredibly cheesy indeed, but it seems like it's some kind of "classic" word used a lot in earlier movies and series. Still it ruined what was left of the "seriousness" of the movie

 

[dshock]

the tree and the jellyfish are straight from miyazaki. mononoke hime is imitated with a fake heart and about one sixth of the plot.

Thats what I'm saying homes, anime-baby, I was waiting for that

 

[physix]

"unobtanium" is incredibly cheesy indeed, but it seems like it's some kind of "classic" word used a lot in earlier movies and series. Still it ruined what was left of the "seriousness" of the movie

I mean, he had 10 years to come up with a better name.

FFS, find an Old English or Latin etymology book and pick out some prefixes . . .!

Gheslonium . . . proto-european prefix (ghelso-) for "thousand", considering the value for the material.

Nenekium . . . proto-euro prefix ne- (for "un") and -nek (for "obtain") . . . yeah, it's stupid because of the catch-all -ium suffix, but I found it in 2 minutes . . . not 10 years.

What's next? Impregnium? Phatbankium? Getlaidium?!?

(actually, I rather like impregnium, cheesy as it is.)

Cameron really did think he could dazzle us blind. And I think, for the most part, he did. Shit like this would normally piss me off beyond reproach. I'm not so angry with this movie, however; it was just so pretty!

 

[BlueFractal]

I suppose he did it as some kind of practical joke, a wink. Humour isn't his best, though

 

[dshock]

Also a bit of Sugiyama's Origins:Spirits of the Past

 

[vegan]

I mean, he had 10 years to come up with a better name.

he didn't come up with it, he picked it up
the word already existed (see wikipedia). it fits the idea that this material is so valuable

 

[marissaaaaaa]

i loved it.
and to everyone who bashed it, there's really no movies being made today with amazing original plots. everything's recycled and redone over and over again. what's that theory? something like at the core of cinema, there's only 3 plots.
idk i thought that this movie meshed together the elements of a love story, action film, and personal struggle very well. most movies are very heavy in 1 of those area's and skimps on the rest. i thought this was a good balance. and the visual's were breathtaking.

 

[GoddessLSD-XTC]

Don't go into it looking for any deep meanings - but hey, it's James Cameron...

There's no deep meaning to this film, like capitalism & consumerism sucks?

 

[TheDeceased]

It's the opposite of deep and meaningful. Deep doesn't mean political. Deep means deep.

It was entertaining, but let's not pretend it's something that it isn't. It's eye candy.

 

[Mentalhead]

Does anyone else feel like this movie is a tripper's wet dream? Don't get me wrong, I recognize that the plot and characters are nothing special, but the theme of such an interconnected world portrayed with such mindblowing graphics really made me reminiscent of the one acid trip I've got under my belt. I'm not sure if I've got it in me to put myself in a public theater while tripping, but if I don't see it on psychedelics now I'm definitely going to do so when it comes out on DVD.

 

[grimble crumble]

Does anyone else feel like this movie is a tripper's wet dream? Don't get me wrong, I recognize that the plot and characters are nothing special, but the theme of such an interconnected world portrayed with such mindblowing graphics really made me reminiscent of the one acid trip I've got under my belt. I'm not sure if I've got it in me to put myself in a public theater while tripping, but if I don't see it on psychedelics now I'm definitely going to do so when it comes out on DVD.

only trouble with that is theres no such thing as 3d for dvd. Im not joking the 3d in the movie is utterly amazing on imax. if I had the money right now, i would totally see this on shrooms

 

[BlueFractal]

Does anyone else feel like this movie is a tripper's wet dream? Don't get me wrong, I recognize that the plot and characters are nothing special, but the theme of such an interconnected world portrayed with such mindblowing graphics really made me reminiscent of the one acid trip I've got under my belt. I'm not sure if I've got it in me to put myself in a public theater while tripping, but if I don't see it on psychedelics now I'm definitely going to do so when it comes out on DVD.

everybody does
However I think the action scenes might be a bit too wild and loud for someone tripping heavy. They should screen a hippiefriendly version with less action and more bioluminuscent goodness

And yeah, it would be better to have a "tripsitter" with you or use some quick-working stuff once you're inside.

 

[GoddessLSD-XTC]

It's the opposite of deep and meaningful. Deep doesn't mean political. Deep means deep.

It was entertaining, but let's not pretend it's something that it isn't. It's eye candy.

U don't get any meaning out of the film? Like maybe: We gotta appreciate Earth and create a sustainable civilization?

I haven't seen Avatar yet but every movie I see, I can find some kind of meaning. (Even if it shows who controls Hollywood -- wolves in sheepskins.) The review I read gave Avatar some kind of racial meaning.

Like, "District 9" had a meaning.

Whose side were U on to win the resources? (I'll bet I'd be on the side of the Aliens in Avatar.) Right now in Darfur & Iraq there are wars for resources (oil).

 

[physix]

But what he's saying is that is a political message, not necessarily a deep message.

One could argue that Slumdog Millionaire, for instance, is deep . . . or even Atonement . . . Primer . . . and in the first, its deepness is outside its political message, of which there is one.

There was, however, an idea that the movie fosters which says that memories can be stored in organic material and passed on to new generation at will. This, of course, is not a new idea, per se -- genetic memory is old hat. Hell, that's why I mentioned Card's Speaker of the Dead in the Ender Series. Old hat or no, I didthink it rather deep; they just don't really do anything with it. That idea is merely the plot device for, and the ramp-up to, the political message, which was not deep.

That said, Cameron could have been real preachy . . . British Imperialism . . . American Manifest Destiny . . . Australia and their aboriginal population . . . the displacement of basically every race The Man considered encroaching in their rightful place . . . science versus nature . . . Despite all that, I didn't really feel preached at. I could have been blinded by the Oh-Look!-Teh-Shiny!, but I doubt it. I have to give Cameron a bit of credit there.

 

[LoveAlways]

Any 'film' where the director sends his entire cast to Hawaii to 'feel it' without shooting a single scene there just makes me fucking angry on principle alone. I'm not going to support something I view as part of what's really wrong with 'Hollywood'... especially something where the plot/ simple interview made me want to bang my head against the steering wheel.

I'm pretty sure all (or at least 90%) of the rainforest scenes were animated, so I would have been very surprised if he had filmed here. But I gotta say, Pandora did remind me a lot of home!!! Maybe thats why, *I* got meaning out of the plot. Sure, it did have it holes, but the message really hit home for me. Especially the quote "They (humans) killed their mother" I almost cried! Maybe its just me...I live in a rainforest, and after growing up a concrete jungle I got a little veklemped from the movie.

Not to mention flying around floating moutains on gigantic birds..in 3D was soooo kick ass!!!!! I got vertigo the next day

 

[Transcendence]

Does anyone else feel like this movie is a tripper's wet dream? Don't get me wrong, I recognize that the plot and characters are nothing special, but the theme of such an interconnected world portrayed with such mindblowing graphics really made me reminiscent of the one acid trip I've got under my belt. I'm not sure if I've got it in me to put myself in a public theater while tripping, but if I don't see it on psychedelics now I'm definitely going to do so when it comes out on DVD.

I saw this movie yesterday in 3d while peaking on 20mg 2C-E.

Thinking back on the event leaves me rather speechless so I'll just say that I highly recommend it.

 

[AmorRoark]

I'm pretty sure all (or at least 90%) of the rainforest scenes were animated, so I would have been very surprised if he had filmed here. But I gotta say, Pandora did remind me a lot of home!!! Maybe thats why, *I* got meaning out of the plot. Sure, it did have it holes, but the message really hit home for me. Especially the quote "They (humans) killed their mother" I almost cried! Maybe its just me...I live in a rainforest, and after growing up a concrete jungle I got a little veklemped from the movie.

Not to mention flying around floating moutains on gigantic birds..in 3D was soooo kick ass!!!!! I got vertigo the next day

I know they're animated. My annoyance wasn't so much that they didn't use a real rain forest but how much money they wasted.