Avatar

“Every person is born twice.”

Swift shot:  Only James Cameron could remake Fern Gully and make me enjoy it!  Or wait, was it Dances With Wolves?  Still, the graphics will astound you!  There are times when it starts to feel like you are watching the Discovery Channel though, like a good hour of the film is just vast, expansive shots of nature on the planet, Pandora.  If that is your thing, if you like that, you will freaking cream over Avatar.  If you are like me and are more into the psychology of a story and the action, you’ll want to hit the virtual fast forward.

Hardly spoiling anything here, and unless you are incredibly slow, you get that Avatar is a criticism of the white’s pillaging of the Native Americans (Na’Vi).  But, what you won’t get from Avatar is a fair assessment of that time.

Avatar takes you through a video journal of Marine veteran, Jake Sully (Sam Worthington), who has lost the use of his legs, but being a mere Corporal, is unable to attain the credits needed for surgery to repair his spine.

Set in 2154, we follow the transformation of Jake, whose twin was murdered for the “paper in his wallet” hence unable to complete his mission as an Avatar driver on the distant, recently discovered planet, Pandora.

Jake never received any training for how to drive one of these Avatars, or Dreamwalkers as the natives refer to them, but once he feels his toes wiggle – the rest is just cake.  Dreamwalkers are essentially bio-bots, mere puppets for the human masters controlling them from a sensory deprivation chamber of sorts.

His instructor is Jane Goodall, no wait, I mean Grace Augustine (Sigourney Weaver), who feels the only way to understand the Na’Vi, is to literally become one of them.  Jake, being a hot-head, undisciplined type, almost immediately finds himself stranded in his new “vehicle”.  But, he is quickly encountered by the Omaticaya Clan princess, Neytiri (Zoe Saldana) who reluctantly teaches him the ways of her tribe.

As Jake becomes more engrossed in the tribal life, and as he learns how magically they interact with the creatures around them, he starts to wonder where dream and reality differ.  He begins to identify more with his Avatar than his wheel-chair bound, human persona.  Jake is torn between his loyalty to his mission or his loyalty to his new family, the Omaticaya Clan.   His mission is to learn how to best negotiate with the Na’Vi, to learn what they might want from the humans, and the stakes are dire – for if he can’t convince them to re-settle, they will be removed by force.

The creatures in this film were nothing short of miraculous, with stellar shots of swooping dragon-like birds that become mounts for the Na’Vi people.    By far one of the better reasons to experience this film, and if you can, in 3D for that authentic feel to the action.  Still, a film can’t stand on special effects and amazing creatures alone – the story has to be compelling.  What amazed me about Star Wars was the story, not the special effects, what amazed me about Avatar was the special effects, not the story.

The story was too one-sided, and becoming a common theme out of Hollywood these days, the greedy humans have messed up their world, so they need to rape someone else’s resources, writ small, that is an attack on all us evil prospering nations currently getting flack in Copenhagen (right as this was released, no less).

James Cameron delivers a magnificent dream, as he launches us into a world far from Earth, yet not far enough away from her corruption.  But, he failed to suck me in without coming across as a hypocrite.  About 95% of the film was really voice-work, thus much of the emotional force was driven by a team of geeks in swivel chairs pounding down energy drinks as they painstakingly captured raw feelings through their “avatars”.

Overall, an amazing visual experience will be shared by all who see this in theaters.  What you won’t all share though is enthusiasm for the overall product.  Some of you will be looking at your watches and thinking, crap, is this movie ever going to end?  It was just too long.  It was incredibly predictable and it was painfully preachy.  Some people might not like sitting there for just short of three hours being lectured to, whilst shelling out their money to endure the lecture.  Still, the kids will love this one, shame Cameron didn’t knock out the profanity, as the film is clearly geared towards merchandising – which typically means kids or forty-year-old virgins will line up to purchase their own . . . Avatars.

BLUE ALERT – SPOILERS AND POLITICS BELOW

What is unobtanium?  Is it gold, where it is just a precious alloy, or is it necessary to the well-being of our “dying planet”?  What kind of things did this Marine Corporal do in theaters before, like in Venezuela?  Watching Battle for Terra, at least the humans were desperate for a new home – in Avatar, we are just assholes apparently who want unobtanium because it is pretty?

Or, maybe it was an attack on progress, had we let the Native Americans alone, had we just never invented certain technologies, maybe we would all be happier – again, being non-human, or savages, primitives?  Like District 9, there is this humans are bad attack again, a veiled attempt to shun us for raping Mother Earth.

Yet, here is Cameron using the most state-of-the-art special effects of any film to date – I am assuming it took more than just rubbing two sticks together . . .   So, before you attack my political critique, remember, you are reading this review on a computer or a cell phone – think about that, Cameron.  Maybe you would be happier sitting around the fire singing kumbaya and worshipping a frakking tree.  But, realistically, you know better.

Case in point, enjoy this film for what it is – FANTASY!  Humans are not perfect, and wars aren’t always fought for the noblest of causes, but I am so sick of Hollywood’s green agenda – get a new theme, you are starting to piss me off – and worse, BORE ME!  This movie clocked in at just under three hours, Fern Gully was only 90 minutes.

What I felt was seriously missing was the classic Native American torture scene of all good westerns of my day.  Where the natives ride into camp, kidnap a few settlers and torture them on a wagon wheel all night long, and the screams echo throughout the night in a garish melody of suffering.  Where was Cameron’s balance?  So sick of one-sided stories, no race is without sin, period.  This film failed to show the darker side of the Na’Vi and came across as weak and uninteresting.  I like my films to have more depth and balance.