Avatar - James Cameron Returns! (Spoilers in thread, obviously!)

Zak Forsman said:
1. The Hurt Locker, Sin Nombre, A Single Man, Zero Bridge, Treeless Mountain, Food Inc, etc, etc.
2. can't say Avatar is better story-wise but it offered a spectacle that everyone HAD to see. even me.

But I never got lost in the film, and wasn't engaged by the story or characters in any meaningful way. it was more like watching a fireworks display. it was strange, my attention kept drifting to the audience. I was often more interested in their reactions than anything the characters were doing. pretty though.
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To note: I'm a big fan of all of Jim Cameron's movies, even yes- Titanic. But, Aliens, Terminator, Terminator 2, all have great stories.
Even TRUE LIES is a fun movie (arguably not the best story ever) but, Avatar seemed a little bland. It was like he tried to hard to make it original.

This is exactly my problem with the film. If hollywood wants to push 3D down our throats we're not going to see a movie like Avatar every time.
Because it's going to get old. If Avatar sets the bar technologically, that's easy enough to meet because the tech is already there.
The next 3D film that comes can meet the bar for the tech, but the only way to be a success is to surpass the story of Avatar's.
However, I don't see any other films making near as much as Avatar has. I just don't see it as a reality.

Does anyone anticipate any films coming out that could gross nearly as much as Avatar has that are also in 3D?

It seems like Hollywood is using 3D as a band-aid to patch up movies that don't have great stories.
For instance, they're doing post-work to make Clash of the Titans 3D. I don't know how the plot is in this film, but it doesn't seem that awe-inspiring.
I know a few other films are getting this 3D re-work treatment. Harry Potter for instance. It's just a way for them to make a few more bucks off of people.
Which I generally don't care about. Honestly, I don't expect myself to walk into another 3D movie any time soon.
Not even Alice in Wonderland. (which just looks like any other boring Tim Burton movie.)
 
Evan S said:
It's just a way for them to make a few more bucks off of people.
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I'm puzzled by the apparent attitude behind this statement. It's like suggesting that for NASA this thing or that "is just a way to launch stuff into orbit" or for the Pentagon that thing or this "is just a way to fight wars."

Please let's not lose sight of the fact that everything is a way to 'make a few more bucks' off the audience. Other things get done along the way - hopefully - but the audience's bucks are what keep the whole operation rolling. Anyone in this industry who launches any project at all without that goal in mind is plain irresponsible.
 
3-D is being used by the studios to raise ticket prices and to provide an experience that's different than what you get in your home theater (which should theoretically inspire you to go spend the money on those higher ticket prices). As Karl said, that's really the point behind the whole movie business, is to get your money off of you and to entice you to spend it at the theater.

If they succeed in making films a better experience by incorporating 3-D, then what's wrong with that? But if it's just a gimmick, then it will go the way of Sensurround (or, the way that 3-D has gone every single time it's been tried).

I saw Harry Potter & The Order of the Phoenix in Sydney in 3-D IMAX (well, it was in IMAX and the last 20 minutes was in 3-D). I went for the novelty and to see how it enhanced the experience.

I doubt I'll be doing that again. It was -- novel, I guess, but it certainly didn't improve the experience of watching the movie.

That said, Avatar in 3-D was ... fine. I don't think the fact it was in 3-D made it any more of a groundbreaking experience. It was certainly the most integrated 3-D experience I've had. But I tend to think it'll probably hold up just fine in 2-D as well.

I also spent the extra to see "Up" in 3-D. I can verify that the 3-D'ness added little if nothing to the experience, because when I bought the 2-D Blu-Ray disc version and watched it, it was every bit as magnificent and compelling and moving and Best-Picture-worthy as the 3-D theatrical experience was. Better, perhaps, because I didn't have to wear the glasses.
 
I don't get all the 3D buzz. It's old hat and although the technology has improved it's still a distraction at best.

I really didn't find Avatar's 3D to be better than any of the others I have seen. A little more subtle maybe, but that's even more of an excuse to ditch it.
The glasses are also annoying.

Give me great 3D without the gear and maybe then we're talking.

MAH
 
Sad Max brings out a fine point. The movie business is a business. The whole idea is to make money. Why is a move criticized from making a boat load of money like Titanic or Avatar? Why do we belittle their success? It looks to me like it's becoming the hip thing to rag on movies like these.

As for the 3D experience, well, yes, it would be better if I didn't have to wear the glasses BUT the technology hasn't gotten to that point yet. I thought it was well done and was quite thankful that there weren't constant reminders being shoved in my fact that it WAS 3D. Instead, it was just one more aspect of the movie.

Barry also makes good point that Hollywood has to compete with television and home theater to get its money back now. Not to mention fighting against piracy. When I saw Avatar, I chose to see it at the IMAX in 3D because I knew I wouldn't get the chance when it comes out on DVD (Blu-ray). I didn't feel cheated by the experience, either.

Who's to say what's best and what does it matter personally to anyone not making a buck off the movies involved?
 
Ticket prices in my area are already artificially inflated. We have some of the highest IMAX prices ever. Nearly 18.50 for a fake IMAX. I'm hearing people paying 7 less dollars in other places.
 
Evan S said:
Ticket prices in my area are already artificially inflated. We have some of the highest IMAX prices ever. Nearly 18.50 for a fake IMAX. I'm hearing people paying 7 less dollars in other places.
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Yeah, ticket prices are getting crazy, but considering the movie cost 200 millions dollars to make, the fact that you get to watch it for 18 bucks is kind of a bargain.
 
Warranted or not, I imagine they are concerned with the cultural impact it might have on cinema, entertainment, the arts, gaming, etc. Also, it's their "buck" which kinda makes it a personal investment. I don't fault anyone for voicing their concerns or praise. it's the indifferent crowd that worries me. and it's the evangelists, on either side, that irritate me.
 
It's odd that the same people who were disagreeing with me about my review of Avatar then turned around and agreed that it is not in the same league as Blade Runner or Alien...

My two part flame of Avatard was in part because of the expectations, I felt, inherent by the constant worshipping of this flick. Like I said, I couldn't lower my expectations to that of Cool World, but I did manage to put them at a nominal Aliens level. This movie being unable to meet his previous work, means that not only does the movie fail, but he also has failed as a storyteller and director.

I think the only thing that's changed is our acceptance of mediocre, dull-witted, hackneyed cinema.

And the idea that the movie is making money because people are telling people to go see it, I said from the beginning that the entire marketing ploy was designed specifically to do just that -- convince people that there was something wrong with them if they didn't see this movie. That agressive attitude can still be seen on forums and in blogs. The marketing was atrocious (and continues to be on talk shows around the clock, both online and off), but I've let that go. Now it's the movie that deserves the reaming.

So, part 1 -- it should have been as good as Aliens. Period. If he couldn't even meet that expectation -- fail.

Part 2 seems to be B57ing over everyone's head here. You cannot possibly realistically for a second even consider that this movie was not in direct opposition to the message it kept touting in every single interview Cameron did. (Because make no mistake, on EVERY single talk show Cameron went on and on not about the Hollywood machine and making an entertaining movie, which all of you are defending, but instead he talked about the film's MESSAGE). This movie's message was so damagingly wrong as it pertains to speciesism I can't even articulate it. Everything about this movie spoke to man's OWNERSHIP over the land and the beasts -- and didn't argue the point. As it regards speciesism, the heroes were just as wretched as the villains -- maybe even moreso as the villains attempted to work out something peaceful with the current inhabitants so as to not have to DESTROY everything and cause WAR and total decimation. The humans didn't want to enslave the Na'vi, they didn't want to harm their sacred things. They wanted to do some mining. And, honestly, they probably could have figured out a way to mine underneath the tree without destroying their home if the indigenous folk would have actually tried working with them.

To put it into real-world context, this film DEFENDED religious wars. This movie said they are right and honorable things. This isn't what happened to the Scots or Irish, and this isn't what happened to the Native Americans. This story was about conflicting ideologies, it just so happened that instead of a holy dust bowl or whatever, it's a magical tree (though not THE magical tree, but whatever).

Cameron is so twisted up in his own world that even HE doesn't understand that his movie is NOT pro-environment, it is NOT against speciesism, this movie is pro-human(oid), pro-ownership and pro-psychotic ideology. EVERYTHING he says this movie is supposed to be in support of it is in DIRECT opposition with.

I understand that it was in 3D and all those shiny lights were really hypnotizing, but, come on, forest for the trees here. It is IMPOSSIBLE to have a truly pro-environment message but then turn around and say you OWN any of the earth. it is IMPOSSIBLE to be against speciesism and then strap a friggin saddle on a flying lizard thing!! That is not the message of environmentalism, or gaia or wiccan beliefs. And hey!! Big surprise, James Cameron is a ::gasp:: shallow human being with shallow understanding of menial human concepts! Maybe he should, I don't know, stick to souless (but entertaining) action/sci-fi/disaster flicks and realize that he has NO IDEA what the hell he's talking about when it comes to higher concepts.

THAT is why this movie is the worst thing I've probably ever endured in cinema. Because I walked into it having been lied to, bold face -- he used something that actually matters, used a MESSAGE as a DEVICE to get a bunch of people to see his movie. It's just so fundamentally wrong. I mean, they didn't even do that with Passion of the Christ!! I'm serious, they did not sell its message -- but Cameron did. And whether he's just an idiot of an "evil genius", this movie, for me, because of what it pretended to represent, will forever be a wretched experience. Unfortunately everywhere you turn people are pointing to this movie as having a "message" that "matters". And hey, if it makes some drunk teenager think twice before setting a forest fire, awesome, but the fact that the teenager has to think twice in the first place shows how degraded our society has become.

Man, but who else can't wait to see the special features on blu-ray? Kickin.

:D
 
Sad Max said:
I'm puzzled by the apparent attitude behind this statement. It's like suggesting that for NASA this thing or that "is just a way to launch stuff into orbit" or for the Pentagon that thing or this "is just a way to fight wars."

Please let's not lose sight of the fact that everything is a way to 'make a few more bucks' off the audience. Other things get done along the way - hopefully - but the audience's bucks are what keep the whole operation rolling. Anyone in this industry who launches any project at all without that goal in mind is plain irresponsible.
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And this is exactly why message and money don't mix...well.

You either walk out of a movie feeling all messaged over or you walk out with some dilluted version of the actual message (and in Avatar's case it goes to a more horrific place that is using message to get money, not unlike if I called someone and asked them to donate to Haiti relief and then pocketed the change).

In the end, if your movie is about MESSAGE, then money has to be secondary. It has to be. There's no other way. Message first, money second. Unfortunately, with the exception of some documentaries and maybe a few indie pics, this can almost never be the case.

Personally I think it may be a problem solved generationally. For a long time we've had people driven to write because of message (or, purpose), and other writers driven to write for monetary gain, fame and general vanity. I think as the decades push on and information and movies get more and more accessible, small successes will be more managable thus allowing writers to formulate ideas that aren't heavy handed or overly concerned either way. It's the EFFORT of moving towards something that results in such decisively bad writing in every format. Remove the effort of achieving traditional stardom (or make things more affordable for the common man) and we might someday get back to something more akin to the ancient writers who were able to compose message and entertainment effectively even while under heavy legal constraints.

Regardless, even if Avatar understood the concepts of speciesism and enviornmentalism, it still would not have been able to succeed at delivering that message because there was too much money on the table.

The exceptions to this are pretty much everything Shakespearean. Since Shakespeare pretty much invented storytelling as we understand it today, you can utilize any of his themes (or, messages) pretty seamlessly in any genre. It's when you get into more complex insights (or, messages that are more advanced than say, "love conquers all") that the great divide seems to happen.

In the end, do the math. If a message NEEDS to be told, it means it is going AGAINST what people have accepted as truth. Thus anything of any real merit as it pertains to message will almost necessarily have to be REVILED initially. But it's the duty of the MESSENGER to formulate an understanding that relates to all mankind, so while his work will be reviled, the intense emotional impact his STORY can overshadow the gag-reflex reaction of deep change his audience will feel upon experiencing his message.

Avatar, because of its SPECTACLE, had the opprotunity to do something and it chose not to. And I'm fine with that. Millions of dollars are spent on movies every day that do nothing more than offer escapism to people who could probably use a lot more realism in their lives, but none of those movies CLAIM to be delivering a MESSAGE of import. Cameron said Avatar would. So he's either an idiot or a liar.

Judging soley by how this movie was universally ACCEPTED and how much MONEY it has made, even the layman can see plainly that it's impossible for this movie to have contained any message of any merit whatsoever. It's just basic math.

Avatar told a SAFE story that appealed to self-hating white people and races that feel oppressed. That's just the bare bones truth of it. Nothing new here. Dancing Wolves, Poking Haunts, pick your poison, this movie's message is simply "how do we make something that will appeal to everyone and make lots of money?"

Good message. A valid message. But don't pretend that's not the message.
 
I always think of the expression

"If everyone in the room says you're drunk,. then you probably are."


The movie did not work for you but apparently has worked for everyone else on the planet. Of course I am generalizing.

I get it man. I am not a fervent supporter of Fight Club or Memento or The Dark Knight ... (I am in the minority)


We get it. You don't like it. But you're not going to talk anyone into not liking it they already do. So why the barrage ?

Me ? I loved it. Best Picture ever ? No/ one of my Fav's ? Yes.

How one could not dig this for pure popcorn entertainment really has me scratching my head. It's not Goodfellas or Apocalypse Now or Godfather of Schindlers or (insert a hundred other films) .........

But it just is fun. Pure entertainment.

Why hate and why pulverize your opinion ?
 
For me it's more of the fact that, the movie isn't Goodfells, or The Godfather, or Schindlers List. It's the fact that everyone wants to jump on the bandwagon of Avatar because they want to make money, not because they want to tell a story. Personally, I think you should want to tell a story before you worry about the money you're going to make from it.
This is a never ending argument...
 
Evan S said:
For me it's more of the fact that, the movie isn't Goodfells, or The Godfather, or Schindlers List. It's the fact that everyone wants to jump on the bandwagon of Avatar because they want to make money, not because they want to tell a story. Personally, I think you should want to tell a story before you worry about the money you're going to make from it.
This is a never ending argument...
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But as many people haves said this is film industry, this is showbiz they are there to make money. If in that money making way they find out that they'll make more money without telling a great story they won't tell that great story.

That's why you also have the indie world were even if you are still looking for money (you have to live, pay rent...) you try to tell a good story. Then there are those hollywood films that say something, that have a good story, But look at the charts, which are the highest grossing films, the ones that hollywood wants? Usually crap films like new moon or transformers.....
 
Chamber005 said:
I
My two part flame of Avatard was in part because of the expectations, I felt, inherent by the constant worshipping of this flick. Like I said, I couldn't lower my expectations to that of Cool World, but I did manage to put them at a nominal Aliens level. This movie being unable to meet his previous work, means that not only does the movie fail, but he also has failed as a storyteller and director.

I think the only thing that's changed is our acceptance of mediocre, dull-witted, hackneyed cinema.

And the idea that the movie is making money because people are telling people to go see it, I said from the beginning that the entire marketing ploy was designed specifically to do just that -- convince people that there was something wrong with them if they didn't see this movie. That agressive attitude can still be seen on forums and in blogs. The marketing was atrocious (and continues to be on talk shows around the clock, both online and off), but I've let that go. Now it's the movie that deserves the reaming.

So, part 1 -- it should have been as good as Aliens. Period. If he couldn't even meet that expectation -- fail.

Part 2 seems to be B57ing over everyone's head here. You cannot possibly realistically for a second even consider that this movie was not in direct opposition to the message it kept touting in every single interview Cameron did. (Because make no mistake, on EVERY single talk show Cameron went on and on not about the Hollywood machine and making an entertaining movie, which all of you are defending, but instead he talked about the film's MESSAGE). This movie's message was so damagingly wrong as it pertains to speciesism I can't even articulate it. Everything about this movie spoke to man's OWNERSHIP over the land and the beasts -- and didn't argue the point. As it regards speciesism, the heroes were just as wretched as the villains -- maybe even moreso as the villains attempted to work out something peaceful with the current inhabitants so as to not have to DESTROY everything and cause WAR and total decimation. The humans didn't want to enslave the Na'vi, they didn't want to harm their sacred things. They wanted to do some mining. And, honestly, they probably could have figured out a way to mine underneath the tree without destroying their home if the indigenous folk would have actually tried working with them.

To put it into real-world context, this film DEFENDED religious wars. This movie said they are right and honorable things. This isn't what happened to the Scots or Irish, and this isn't what happened to the Native Americans. This story was about conflicting ideologies, it just so happened that instead of a holy dust bowl or whatever, it's a magical tree (though not THE magical tree, but whatever).

Cameron is so twisted up in his own world that even HE doesn't understand that his movie is NOT pro-environment, it is NOT against speciesism, this movie is pro-human(oid), pro-ownership and pro-psychotic ideology. EVERYTHING he says this movie is supposed to be in support of it is in DIRECT opposition with.

I understand that it was in 3D and all those shiny lights were really hypnotizing, but, come on, forest for the trees here. It is IMPOSSIBLE to have a truly pro-environment message but then turn around and say you OWN any of the earth. it is IMPOSSIBLE to be against speciesism and then strap a friggin saddle on a flying lizard thing!! That is not the message of environmentalism, or gaia or wiccan beliefs. And hey!! Big surprise, James Cameron is a ::gasp:: shallow human being with shallow understanding of menial human concepts! Maybe he should, I don't know, stick to souless (but entertaining) action/sci-fi/disaster flicks and realize that he has NO IDEA what the hell he's talking about when it comes to higher concepts.

THAT is why this movie is the worst thing I've probably ever endured in cinema. Because I walked into it having been lied to, bold face -- he used something that actually matters, used a MESSAGE as a DEVICE to get a bunch of people to see his movie. It's just so fundamentally wrong. I mean, they didn't even do that with Passion of the Christ!! I'm serious, they did not sell its message -- but Cameron did. And whether he's just an idiot of an "evil genius", this movie, for me, because of what it pretended to represent, will forever be a wretched experience. Unfortunately everywhere you turn people are pointing to this movie as having a "message" that "matters". And hey, if it makes some drunk teenager think twice before setting a forest fire, awesome, but the fact that the teenager has to think twice in the first place shows how degraded our society has become.

Man, but who else can't wait to see the special features on blu-ray? Kickin.

:D
Click to expand...

I'm going to take your own advice and ignore you.
 
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