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calimacOkay, I give in. I was impressed. As I took my $9 (for a weekday early matinee!) ticket, I muttered to myself, "It better be worth it." It was.
Once before now, I was talked into seeing a completely fresh (i.e. not a sequel, not based on other previous material) huge special-effects SF blockbuster film where the plot was supposed to be a secondary consideration, to say the least. From that one, I came out saying no more than "Not bad." The sfx were up to par, but the plot clichés were so hammy, the script so clumsy, the directing and acting so bad, the comic relief so grating, I could say no more than that.
That film was, of course, Star Wars. This film is better than that one, much much better. The overall plot is just as hackneyed, but the execution of that plot is far superior. The clichés aren't written like clichés, and that makes all the difference.
However, while Lucas was out to cheese off people who like good dialogue and intelligent comedy, Cameron has his own list of types of people to cheese off. Avatar has a three-act structure, to wit:
Act One. A war movie. Without much fighting, but not for people who don't like war movies.
Act Two. The hero goes native. This part is not for people who are afraid of heights. I cannot recall any reviews warning of this, but dear god, is it ever not for people who are afraid of heights.
Act Three. Enough fighting to fill two war movies.
Miscellaneous observations:
1. There should be no argument about this: the aliens are blue American Indians, nothing more nor less. Every single cultural cue they give, from their clothing down to the music associated with them in the score, is aimed straight at the heart of the amalgamated Hollywood/Newage stereotype of the Noble Indian.
1a. The almost McCaffreyesque empathetic relationship between the aliens and theirhorses land-steeds and dragons air-steeds emphatically included, the electric extension cords by which they express it nonwithstanding.
2. Not only are the aliens blue, so is everything else. And dark. The entire movie, even the scenes set among Earth hardware, has the coloring of Peter Jackson's Lothlórien.
3. Having the hero be a tall blue anthropomorphic non-human named Sully kept distractingly reminding me of Monsters, Inc., which, as you will recall, also featured a tall blue anthropomorphic non-human named Sully.
3a. The only other film that was not about a white guy learning how to be an Indian that Act Two reminded me of at all was Disney's Tarzan, which is about a white guy learning to be an African ape.
4. When Sully and Nefertiti, or whatever her name is, are having their courting scene and she starts enumerating all the other women in the tribe he could marry, it occurred to me that we haven't met any of these people. The entire tribe appears to consist of four identifiable individuals and a whole bunch of anonymous extras. (More extras than I would have thought a hunting-gathering society in the jungle with so little infrastructure could support, but whatever.)
5. The Colonel is a bad-ass muthah. How do we know he is a bad-ass muthah? Three ways. First, his voice, which has but one register, loud, whether he's in battle or discussing intimate personnel matters with a soldier. Second, the vein throbbing in his forehead. Third, the way he likes to go outside without the necessary facemask, just to show how tough he is.
6. Mutiny and going AWOL are considered heroic acts by the script. No wonder conservatives are PO'd by this film.
7. Why is Trudy the only regular soldier to join the mutineers? Did she get infected by spending too much time with the scientists?
8. The other scientist guy, Norm, is present to demonstrate at the start how much Sully doesn't know. After that he's mostly superfluous. Keeping him out of the center of the plot may be a good thing, as he kept reminding me of the guy from Mystery Science Theater. I don't think he actually is the guy from Mystery Science Theater, but he sure looked and sounded like him.
9. Grace is mysteriously dropped after she Becomes One with Mother Nature. Did her spirit play any part in convincing Mother Nature to abandon her declared neutrality and accede to Sully's recruitment pitch? I don't think the script discusses this.
10. Of all the glaringly objectionable things in the movie, I can't recall anybody mentioning this. Did you notice that of the (if I haven't forgotten anybody) five "good guys" among the humans, the two women both die the real death, while the three men all survive? Did that bother anybody?
11. When Sully announces his big battle plan to the aliens, which is basically for every tribe on the planet to make suicidal runs at armored vehicles, my heart sank. The Indians actually tried pretty much this strategy against the U.S. Army, and it didn't work. However, it works this time because the aliens have two things on their side that the Indians didn't. One is the aforementioned Mother Nature, who makes the invulnerable-hide hammerhead beasties show up when and only when the plot requires them, and the other - not discussed in the plot - is apparently a new arrow technology that can pierce plexiglas shields.
12. The ending is supposed to be happy, but I see trouble ahead. The humans (except for Norm and Max, who are going to have a tough time of it without avatars or support crew) have been kicked out. But if they have the resources they've been shown to have, and if they need the unobtainium as badly as we're told they do, then they're going to do exactly what the 19th-century U.S. Army would have done in this situation after a similar defeat. They're going to return with greater force and, in the language of The Flying Sorcerers, burn this family-making planet down to the bedrock.
Once before now, I was talked into seeing a completely fresh (i.e. not a sequel, not based on other previous material) huge special-effects SF blockbuster film where the plot was supposed to be a secondary consideration, to say the least. From that one, I came out saying no more than "Not bad." The sfx were up to par, but the plot clichés were so hammy, the script so clumsy, the directing and acting so bad, the comic relief so grating, I could say no more than that.
That film was, of course, Star Wars. This film is better than that one, much much better. The overall plot is just as hackneyed, but the execution of that plot is far superior. The clichés aren't written like clichés, and that makes all the difference.
However, while Lucas was out to cheese off people who like good dialogue and intelligent comedy, Cameron has his own list of types of people to cheese off. Avatar has a three-act structure, to wit:
Act One. A war movie. Without much fighting, but not for people who don't like war movies.
Act Two. The hero goes native. This part is not for people who are afraid of heights. I cannot recall any reviews warning of this, but dear god, is it ever not for people who are afraid of heights.
Act Three. Enough fighting to fill two war movies.
Miscellaneous observations:
1. There should be no argument about this: the aliens are blue American Indians, nothing more nor less. Every single cultural cue they give, from their clothing down to the music associated with them in the score, is aimed straight at the heart of the amalgamated Hollywood/Newage stereotype of the Noble Indian.
1a. The almost McCaffreyesque empathetic relationship between the aliens and their
2. Not only are the aliens blue, so is everything else. And dark. The entire movie, even the scenes set among Earth hardware, has the coloring of Peter Jackson's Lothlórien.
3. Having the hero be a tall blue anthropomorphic non-human named Sully kept distractingly reminding me of Monsters, Inc., which, as you will recall, also featured a tall blue anthropomorphic non-human named Sully.
3a. The only other film that was not about a white guy learning how to be an Indian that Act Two reminded me of at all was Disney's Tarzan, which is about a white guy learning to be an African ape.
4. When Sully and Nefertiti, or whatever her name is, are having their courting scene and she starts enumerating all the other women in the tribe he could marry, it occurred to me that we haven't met any of these people. The entire tribe appears to consist of four identifiable individuals and a whole bunch of anonymous extras. (More extras than I would have thought a hunting-gathering society in the jungle with so little infrastructure could support, but whatever.)
5. The Colonel is a bad-ass muthah. How do we know he is a bad-ass muthah? Three ways. First, his voice, which has but one register, loud, whether he's in battle or discussing intimate personnel matters with a soldier. Second, the vein throbbing in his forehead. Third, the way he likes to go outside without the necessary facemask, just to show how tough he is.
6. Mutiny and going AWOL are considered heroic acts by the script. No wonder conservatives are PO'd by this film.
7. Why is Trudy the only regular soldier to join the mutineers? Did she get infected by spending too much time with the scientists?
8. The other scientist guy, Norm, is present to demonstrate at the start how much Sully doesn't know. After that he's mostly superfluous. Keeping him out of the center of the plot may be a good thing, as he kept reminding me of the guy from Mystery Science Theater. I don't think he actually is the guy from Mystery Science Theater, but he sure looked and sounded like him.
9. Grace is mysteriously dropped after she Becomes One with Mother Nature. Did her spirit play any part in convincing Mother Nature to abandon her declared neutrality and accede to Sully's recruitment pitch? I don't think the script discusses this.
10. Of all the glaringly objectionable things in the movie, I can't recall anybody mentioning this. Did you notice that of the (if I haven't forgotten anybody) five "good guys" among the humans, the two women both die the real death, while the three men all survive? Did that bother anybody?
11. When Sully announces his big battle plan to the aliens, which is basically for every tribe on the planet to make suicidal runs at armored vehicles, my heart sank. The Indians actually tried pretty much this strategy against the U.S. Army, and it didn't work. However, it works this time because the aliens have two things on their side that the Indians didn't. One is the aforementioned Mother Nature, who makes the invulnerable-hide hammerhead beasties show up when and only when the plot requires them, and the other - not discussed in the plot - is apparently a new arrow technology that can pierce plexiglas shields.
12. The ending is supposed to be happy, but I see trouble ahead. The humans (except for Norm and Max, who are going to have a tough time of it without avatars or support crew) have been kicked out. But if they have the resources they've been shown to have, and if they need the unobtainium as badly as we're told they do, then they're going to do exactly what the 19th-century U.S. Army would have done in this situation after a similar defeat. They're going to return with greater force and, in the language of The Flying Sorcerers, burn this family-making planet down to the bedrock.
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no subject
Date: 2010-01-23 08:46 am (UTC)12) As I said in my review, the Na'vi weren't as smart as the Fremen in Dune (which they otherwise reminded me of, in a jungle sort of way), and didn't make some sort of deal with The Corporation where they supply Unobtanium on their terms.
10) No, I didn't notice and I can't say it bothers me. There is no quota system, and if you're going to have the leader of the scientists be a woman and the leader of the scientists has to die first so Sully lives, so be it. And having a female warrior die nobly also works.
6) Indeed. This is the first post-9/11 movie I can think of where the military is (are?) the bad guys. Still, they're the bad guys for the Hal 9000 reason: The mission went awry and all problems look like a nail.
no subject
Date: 2010-01-23 11:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-01-23 05:55 pm (UTC)