AVATAR... Thoughts?

[Canadian Turtle]

Ok... so it blows me away that non of you have said anything about this... or as soon as this goes up everyone is going to freak and tell me I am double threading about something and get all mad... blah blah blah anyways.

AVATAR! just saw it! I am not sure at what point the high will calm down, but this was incredible. I don't even know how a movie critic can say anything bad about it (well I'm not stupid and I know how they could, but bare with me). This movie is yet again an amazing bench mark set by one of the best movie makers of our time! A very important techinical achievment.

Not to mention this movie has an incredibly important and powerful message! I know I am a fan of epics, so I will just say, this is one of the best movies I have ever seen... we'll see what I think tomorrow, hahaha but right now, BOOYA!

If I was ever given the honor to say anything to James Cameron, all I could say is "thank you".

[Brodie]

It was just OK.

It was essentially a western...not really a powerful message.

It was neat to look at, but it was too long, and the cat people were goofy looking and distracting.

[Ninjinister]

Honestly, it does not look very interesting to me at all.

[XERO]

It pissed me off that it wasn't the OTHER Avatar. Blaheh.

[Canadian Turtle]

Interesting point of view. I would totally agree that it wasn't a totally original idea, as it was a cowboys and Indians movie in space, but that was kinda the point.

So I will make two points in response to your post, no offense to you though brotha.

1. I am not sure if people will appreciate the scope of what they are seeing, this is more or less history in the making when it comes to visual effects, but I think the viewer is to spoiled by ejaculatory crap like what we see in Transformers and so on. Cameron actually invented all knew technologies to capture this movie. I found the world and beings stunningly beautiful, not only from a visual arts perspective but also from a character design and humanoid form perspective, but thats me I guess.

2. The story and message, is old and true, but what I mean is it was very relevant to today, wrapped in a nice package. I don't just mean the boring global warming and love the environment message, that's just one element. What I mean is we don't see the "good vs evil", "week against the strong" story enough any more. Lets face it, there are perallels in themes with this movie that harken back to the Turtles and the world of media in the late 80s and early 90s, something I think we don't see enough of today. This story had so many layers of important messages, from the understanding of our world around us (which us as a species haven't even scratched the surface), the connection of the human body with powers beyond our pitiful 5 scences that I believe are relevent avenues of discussion in of themselves, colonialism and hatred of what we don't understand (another thing North Americans are MAJORLY guilty of), the harvesting of other cultures their identies and resources which us as Nroth Americans have rapped from parts of the world thousands of times over (i.e. diamond mining in Africa and so on and so on), the list could go on and on with this movie.

I am not saying these things don't appear in other movies, and have already for many years. What I am saying is, I as a viewer and movie lover felt this movie captured many of these important and touching themes, and packaged them in one of the most stunning movies I have ever seen and made it all very enjoyable without going into the realm of cheesy. I bought it full heatedly, but again that's just my opinion.

[Brodie]

I'm not saying it isn't visually appealing. Everything looks good, better than Transformers (except the main aliens). The planet, the plants, the wild animals, all that is great.

Cameron hired real botanists, and linguists to create everything in the film, and for these things to have a realistic basis (like the florescence/fish/plants in the water of Puerto Rico). Thats great and all....but really, we ll just watched a better looking FERN GULLY.

[BoggleKng]

I want to see it, I will let you know that I think after I do.. And what's wrong with Fern Gully?

[Dejablue]

I went and saw Avatar. And just finished watching the Spoony Review this morning.


http://spoonyexperiment.com/2009/12/...-19-09-avatar/ I've gotta agree. The subtext in this movie is really shallow. It's just white guilt and American guilt in one flashy and admittedly beautiful package. But seriously this story was 10 years in the making? Really? Look throughout history everyone in the world has been a bastard to somebody else. I'm American (though not white) and this kind of hollywood lecturing is getting on my nerves. At best I tuned it out but I'd rather not have to deal with these types of messages in my movies.

I'm trying to escape reality not have it haggerdly shoved in my face in high budget theatrical productions.

[Spitfire]

Originally Posted by Canadian Turtle

Ok... so it blows me away that non of you have said anything about this

People on here aren't interested in good movies made by good directors.

I plan on seeing it in 3-D IMAX as it was intended to be viewed. Cameron has yet to let me down and with the critical consensus on this film I doubt he will.

[Brodie]

Originally Posted by Spitfire

People on here aren't interested in good movies made by good directors.

Oh my god, you got into some half-assed film courses and think it entitles you to act like an elitist douchebag? At least play it off a little but and make it elitist undertones of douchebaggery.

But as a general statement, its not entirely false. Just have a bit more tact.


Still, I really liked Fern Gully 2.0, people should check it out.

[Samhain]

It was alright. Would look nice on a hd tv.

[The Stryker]

Eh. It was ok.

Really stupid at times.

[poiuytre]

It was alright. It really is Dances With Wolves: Alien Edition, both premise and structure-wise. It's the same old "Americans/humans are selfish and don't care about nature or others" story we've been spoon-fed a hundred times before, with the same level of preaching and condescension as always. I expected a lot more in terms of story given how long it's been in the oven.

The visuals were really impressive but I had a few gripes with them too. At times it suffered a bit from having too much stuff onscreen, like the modern Star Wars entries. The fauna and flora of the world moves and glows to draw your attention to every inch of the screen at the same time. This can be distracting and drew some of the scenes a bit out of focus for me. The floating landmasses with an endless supplies of water pouring out of it bugged me a considerable amount, given how much time was spent on researching plant-life to make the planet feel real and natural. There is just no way that is possible and it's one of the more stupid fantasy-tropes which no amount of suspension of disbelief can salvage.

Acting-wise it was pretty good across the board. Sam Worthington, Giovanni Ribisi and especially Sigourney Weaver delivered some great performances but Stephen Lang stole the show for me. I loved him. He had me in tears every time he showed up. He looks like a mix between Chip Hazard from Small Soldiers and Duke Nukem ...and I suppose that's exactly how he acts too. He is the most red-blooded HOO-AH American-military asshole you could imagine. Praising his scars to show what a badass he is, grunting heavily while lifting weights the size of himself, sipping his coffee during some genocide,... He was amazing. My favorite scene was when

Spoiler:

the crew broke out of the prison and tried to escape the base. Quaritch hears they're making a break for it and he storms outside to shoot them up. They warn him that he must wear an oxygen mask but he's all F- THAT I DON'T NEED TO BREATHE and he starts emptying his clip. He was also the only one whose mech had a gigantic mech-sized combat-knife instead of a gun. The scene where Giovanni Ribisi starts laughing in Sigourney Weaver's face was priceless too.

Did it live up to the 10+ year build-up and hype? Was this a story that couldn't have been told a decade ago like Cameron claimed? No and double no. The movie didn't deliver in those aspects. Was this an entertaining movie? Yeah, definitely. A bit on the long side, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. Especially the action scenes.

[jaymq]

Looks like I'll have to watch Dances with wolves.

I do plan on seeing this, it looks good. might be a while before I post my opinion on it though.

[Mecha Cow]

It was OK. Nice visuals, but hardly the revolution it was hyped up to be. I find it hard to believe that this was worked on for a decade, since presentation aside, the story was nothing that hasn't already been done a million miles before. It didn't help that the movie lacked any subtlety whatsoever, and that none of the characters aside from Mary-Su... err, Jake were actually developed at all. Also, the last hour or so was nothing but cliché bullsh*t and of course, the movie was way too f*cking long.

That said, it was nice for what it was, but nothing more.

[Canadian Turtle]

Wow this forum never fails to impress! hahaha

I don't want to bash specific peoples opinions, because hey! Those are your opinions and that's cool! I'm all for that! I would just have to disagree with many of them. To address one issue in my opinion that has been dramatically overlooked; why did it take so long and IS such a bench mark movie??? Did you not realize 98.9 % of what you see on screen was completely manufactured in a computer...? Did you not realize he invented totally new technologies to capture this movie? Movies with a lot of CG are almost never done well now adays, even the over budgeted ones. I love Terminator, but #4 had some of the worst chroma keying in movie history! hahah, in my opinion Avatar CG was done the best I have ever seen it done.

I found it to be well balanced and although a lot to look at I was into the story, so it didn't affect me that way. I also found the story to be very deep in subtleties. Not to mention even when I saw how long it was going to be, I was PUMPED! I hate these stupid short movies that try to cram way to much splurge graphics and no plot in less than 90 minutes so they can make more money pumping short sh!t through the theaters.

Furn Gully (awesome movie), yes essentially the same story, Avatar, yes the story has been told before. WHY THE HELL DOES THIS MATTER!?! every story is already done, and no this story or theme is NOT told very well by Hollywood AT ALL! Hollywood is JAMMED PACKED with complete ignorant movies, watch any American war movie and tell me what you see! What was Mel Gibson's "Patriot" about? And where the F were the natives in that movie?? did they not exist in his world? And god forbid we ever see a military movie about any other nation in history. Avatar was a timely story because of many things going on in the world even on the exact date the movie was released.

Anyways in my opinion it was a well placed and well packaged age old story, done with extreme perfection and re-invented movie making completely from a technical perspective.

Originally Posted by Brodie

Oh my god, you got into some half-assed film courses and think it entitles you to act like an elitist douchebag? At least play it off a little but and make it elitist undertones of douchebaggery.

Ouch dude, for one thing he wasn't making any direct relation to you, oh and I take offense to that because I went to film school, I work in the film industry, I know this guy, and no he is no douchebag! So if you take offense to what he was saying, then it kinda makes me wonder why!?

In fact if you look at who and what he was quoting he was pointing to the blatant fact I was saying, that NO ONE comes on a message board to talk good things about anything, they all want to bitch about stupid Sh!t, and thats not just on here. I guess I better get used to it hahaha.

I'm done.

[Spitfire]

Originally Posted by Canadian Turtle

Ouch dude, for one thing he wasn't making any direct relation to you, oh and I take offense to that because I went to film school, I work in the film industry, I know this guy, and no he is no douchebag! So if you take offense to what he was saying, then it kinda makes me wonder why!?

In fact if you look at who and what he was quoting he was pointing to the blatant fact I was saying, that NO ONE comes on a message board to talk good things about anything, they all want to bitch about stupid Sh!t, and thats not just on here. I guess I better get used to it hahaha.

I'm done.

Thank you, and you're right. I'm glad someone knows what I'm talking about. People need to relax.

[Brodie]

Originally Posted by Canadian Turtle

Ouch dude, for one thing he wasn't making any direct relation to you, oh and I take offense to that because I went to film school, I work in the film industry, I know this guy, and no he is no douchebag! So if you take offense to what he was saying, then it kinda makes me wonder why!?

In fact if you look at who and what he was quoting he was pointing to the blatant fact I was saying, that NO ONE comes on a message board to talk good things about anything, they all want to bitch about stupid Sh!t, and thats not just on here. I guess I better get used to it hahaha.

I was busting his balls. I wasn't taking it personally. I -know- I enjoy lame movies, and make no effort to cover that fact. I WAS busting his balls over the fact that he was acting holier-than-thou.

As an aside, I agree with everything you're saying about Avatar's look. I don't think anyone is disagreeing that it LOOKS really great. And I would like to imagine that most people here understand that the majority of things on screen was manufactured by computers. It looks great. The story though is where it gets weird.

And I'm sorry, but when the weird cat-people

Spoiler:

sex scene

happened, I knew an incredibly number of people on furry boards everywhere just wet themselves.

[Roseangelo]

Originally Posted by Canadian Turtle

Furn Gully (awesome movie), yes essentially the same story, Avatar, yes the story has been told before. WHY THE HELL DOES THIS MATTER!?!

Well, ever since CGI entered the industry as the standard tool for special effects, including character effects - most specifically with the release of Star Wars: Episode I in 1999 - the most common movie review has been, "It looked pretty, but the story sucked." So I'm gonna be crazy and say that yes, the story does matter.

I haven't seen Avatar, but probably will over the Christmas holiday even though I have not been able to get into the hype over this movie simply because everything I've seen suggests that the story is cliche and unoriginal.

I won't disagree that Avatar looks amazing, or that the technology used/created to make it is amazing on its own, but if my suspicions that the plot is as cliche and unoriginal as other people's comment here would seem to support, I don't understand how this is so forgivable just because the movie looks really pretty.

But I'll go into the movie giving it the benefit of the doubt. Yes, every story has been told before, more or less. Star Wars and Harry Potter are essentially the same story, though obviously vastly different. Maybe Avatar changes up the FernGully story enough to become something new... I guess I'll find out.

[The Stryker]

So just because it's really pretty and took a long time to get done, it's a great movie.

Never mind that the characters are cardboard cutouts and the main character is one the biggest Mary Sues I have ever seen. My eyes were happy. UNOBTAINIUM FOR ALL!