I would have to say that this film is the pinnacle of what is wrong with modern storytelling. The idea that all people want to see is awesome CGI effects and action scenes. To further the point, let's do a little history on the film's writer/director James Cameron.
Some of his more popular films in the 80s and 90s, were the Terminator movies. Underneath the premise of the films is a theme mankind's technology eventually getting out of hand and enslaving them. Especially in the second one, where the main character laments to one of the company men responsible for creating the terminators. "Men like you invented the hydrogen bomb. You think you're so creative. All you know how to create is death and destruction!"
Part of the paranoia in the 80s and 90s was the belief that man would eventually be overrun by his own inventions, whether by nuclear war or something else. Well, here we are and Cameron's prophecy has come true.
Just not how he thought it would.
While machines haven't taken over the world, they have taken over huge portions of our storytelling. Gone are the days when one had to have a successful premise to make a good movie. Now it's like, "Give 'em explosions, gunfights, and neon light shows and they'll buy a ticket." Hence, this film.
If you want to know the story for this movie, just watch Pocahontas, Dances with Wolves, or Atlantis: The Lost Empire and you'll be able to guess Avatar point by point. But the trouble with this story, is it goes on far too long. That's bad because I always think movies should take some time to develop things, but since I knew exactly what the film was going to do, I was just stuck in "hurry up and get on with it" mode.
As for the characters, the main character, Jake Sully, was the only one who had any character arc, but again, I knew exactly how he would develop so I didn't care. None of the other characters were any good either. But last but not least, meet Colonel Miles Quaritch, the worst written villain I've ever seen. He's a five year old archetype bully. No character, no depth, just meanness. Why is he so mean? We don't know. Why is his language only violence? We don't know. Why does he want to blow up trees? We don't know and unless you actually believe trees are some kind of spiritual energy, why should we care?
That brings us to the next point. I found the parts about praying to trees, chanting to trees, and your soul going to dwell eternal in a tree to be utterly stupid. And Cameron is hardly subtle about it. It was all as subtle as a punch to my kidneys.
Lastly, given Cameron's political beliefs, this film is clearly an attack on imperialism. American military imperialism at least. The film seems fine with the aliens imposing their rules and values on the humans and on us, the audience.
I will say this, though. The films effects were great. However, they're the only reason this film doesn't totally bomb. And it's not good when effects are the only thing holding the film up.
One last thing. Listen to the monologue at the end of Terminator 2. In summary, it goes like this:
I face the future with hope. Because if a machine, a Terminator can learn the value of human life, maybe we can too.
Watch Avatar and see how much value is placed on human life in that film.
All in all, this film is a testament to technology taking over film making. Funny it should come from a man like James Cameron who made such predictions back in the 80s and 90s.Final Thoughts:
Terrible movie, good light show.
Avatar is a phenomenal movie. I think that you have to understand how much time was actually spent on this movie and how many lives went into the creation of this world. I feel that ten years of writing and creating the Avatar world deserves more than the cynical bashes that it received in the last year. Personally, I can't look at that film and hate it because it was such a beautiful creation. If you are basing your "hate" on the fact that story was unoriginal, then I think you are missing something here. When you are going to a movie, the story is only the surface, it's whats underneath that filmmakers like you and I need to be searching. In response to the shallowness of some of the characters, I feel as if nothing ever handed to the audience in this film. For a great deal of these characters it may require some extra thought and regard to where they have been and maybe even require you as a viewer to create your own understanding of why they do what they do. I dunno just a thought. I would hate to come across as narrow minded in all of this. Good points, mate.
ReplyDeleteI've only seen the movie once and I really didn't like it and thought it was a waste of my time. Sure, the effects were great but I honestly didn't care about that even though I probably should considering i'm DMA major.
ReplyDeleteI agree that the storyline was pathetic and just plain weird, and I didn't really care about the time spent into the movie because I expected better.
But once again, I've only seen it once and my first impressions of movies aren't usually great. I had the same feeling with Titanic since I've only seen it once. I don't know if i'd have the patience to sit through Avatar again though.
I personally believe everything James Cameron does is overrated, but so is Disney and I love them so not really sure why I dislike them.