Hard to make out much of what was going on in that bootleg, but it felt like a James Cameron film that's for sure. I said the same thing when I saw the sneak preview. I really don't wanna get my hopes up only to be let down, but shoot I've been waiting for another film by him for a decade. So it's difficult not to temper my expectations.
This movie is a dime. Without seeing the movie, i'm gonna proclaim it the greatest movie ever. over Dark Knight and those damn godfather movies.
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I don't get what so great about this movie? Fanboys have been pissing their pants for almost a decade talking about this once vaporware movie. Yeah looks amazing in terms of graphics but so does the work done lately by Pixar and co. Me personally I can't dig those goofy looking elvish creatures in purple.
The potential problem, and which we won't know for sure until it comes out, is if Cameron has suffered from the same insulated Hollywood mentality that George Lucas fell prey too when he was laboring through writing the 'prequels' - ie he lost complete touch with what his fans wanted and instead created something to play to the small insular bubble-world of hyper-liberal cultural elites, and made it about infantile politics instead of a good old fashioned adventure. The thing which worries me about this movie of Cameron's is that it gives off whiffs of the same thing - thinly-disguised anti-Americanism, environmentalism at the expense of all else, granting sainthood to the naked savages and demonizing the technologically-advanced and profit-driven bad guys. I hope I am totally off base on this, and Cameron has really never pushed any heavy-handed political messages (apart from the goofy ending to the Abyss), so maybe it won't end up being yet another in a long line of imbecilic panderings to people who hate America. Crossing my fingers..
Why Avatar looks like it's gonna suck: The plotline (about going to help our troops, only to realize that we are in the wrong) is nothing new. They did it 15 years ago with Steven Seagal in On Deadly Ground. They even did it in outer space 11 years ago with Star Trek Insurrection. And now they're doing it all over again. Yawn. The secondary plotline of a handicapped guy living through a different body has already been done. The concept was done in Gattaca, and the sci-fi version of it was very recently done with Surrogates. Hell, they even did it in one of the Spy Kids movies. The imagery looks fake. When I see the islands of land floating around in mid-air, I think, "Wow. That looks really really fake. How would big chunks of earth float around like that? Well, they wouldn't. It looks fake." The CGI characters look fake. Normally this would be okay. I've enjoyed Beowulf and other CGI films that look fake. But the fact that this film mixes that fake CGI with live-action actors, makes the CGI look... well, fake... in a sucky way. The motion looks fake. CGI movies still haven't mastered the art of making their characters and camera angles realistic enough, and this doesn't look like it's any different. Ugh, I've still got a really bad taste in my mouth from that horrible Terminator movie, which placed way too much focus on Sam Worthington's character. So much so, that when I see him in this trailer, I think, "Ugh. Not him, again." So, from that trailer I don't anything appealing from the movie. Really. Not one thing. The only thing that MIGHT save the movie is that James Cameron is behind it and he's made some good movies in the past. ... but then again, he also made Piranha Part Two: The Spawning and Xenogenesis.
How do you know you're a hater? When you come up with a list like this. Seriously, Gattaca. Ethan Hawke wasn't crippled, he was deemed by society to be inferior. And Surrogates? Isn't that closer to the concept of the Matrix than what we see in Avatar? Cameron's basically created a completely new world and new race of beings. It's supposed to be fake, because it is...it doesn't exist. One big complaint I've heard is that they still haven't mastered the eyes. From the still shots and trailers that I've seen, I call BS on that. You can see a whole lot of emotion in some of those shots emanating from their faces and the level of detail is amazing...easily trumps anything that has come before. The storyline I'll give you that, it's nothing new...that doesn't mean he can't present it in a fresh new light. Plus we have to remember that he's been working on the idea for over a decade...since even before Titanic if I recall. This is the guy that has done Terminator, Aliens, Abyss, T2, True Lies, Titanic....that is a STRONG resume. I have no doubt this will be a winner...but will it be a winner at the box office, that is definitely questionable considering the enormous budget.
And after seeing the trailer myself....amazing. I'm pretty skeptical that the cgi and 3d will come close to meeting Cameron's hype. But that trailer looks like a Cameron film through and through...Lucas got it wrong because he focused on the technology and sacrificed the characters and story. So many have done that. I don't think it happens here. But I am a little worried the film might drag a little bit when it turns focus solely on the Na'avi.
It looks like a sci-fi video game crossed with Dances with Wolves and a smattering of Braveheart "our land, our freedom" motivational talk.
