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

Well I don't necessarily think 3d is a gimmick, I just hate how it strains my eyes. If it didn't do that I could see it adding to filmmaking.
 
I agree with you Mark, to me the mech suits seemed oddly fake, maybe rendered weirdly or
something?

The 3D was completely comfortably for me, not one twinge and my glasses clad mate had no problems either.

Hey sad max finally an avatar change. How long's it been?
 
Hey so who saw this in 2d? I am going again with my friends and I am trying to decide if I should convince them to go to the 3d showing or not. Did you people who saw it in 2d still enjoy it a lot?
 
Coming out mode on:

I feel bad!

Saw it and I did not like it.
Everyone I talked to just loved it, the forums are flooded with praise - but I did not like it.

Dang I´m not only a minority,
I seem to be the only person on the planet that does not like that movie.

Maybe I´m too old. I saw that "3D is the future" thing already twice in my life
and they also tried that, a few times before I was even born.

I can´t help it but in my book there is no NEW 3D at all.
There is nothing in Avatar, that is different from the 3D I saw in amusement parks 25 years ago.
Same thing, even the same pola glasses.

The 3D animation did not work for me ether.
IMHO even the characters in Toy Story 1 had more emotions as those blue folks.

That "Pocahontas in Space" story was thin and foreseeable - did not cut it for me ether.
The only positive aspect in th whole thing for me was Sigourney Weaver.

Now what? Looks like I´m the only Schmuck that doesn`t sing the gospel.
Am I totally of the track?

Coming out mode off.


Frank
 
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Frank, this is movies... They are so diverse and people are so diverse, that not everyone will agree... And that is why Movies are so great!
 
A film will never be great for everyone, say Apocalypse now, I hated that movie, don't ask me why, but I hated it.... Maybe the long running time (the redux version is 202 minutes), the theme, the story I don't know...
But that film is in the top 250 of imdb #36 as avatar is ( as of this time is number 21).
 
I only like the begining of Apocalypse now, after that I just can't watch it. So I'm with you on that. I loved Avatar though.

There is no perfect movie IMHO. Hell, I thought Titanic was great, but many here hate it. But for the life of me I will never understand how ANYONE could not love "Predator" It does not get any better than that.:love4:
 
I'd love him to return to something more claustrophobic and dark. With 'Aliens' and 'Terminator' Cameron has become seriously admired by me, and I'll always go back to watch those movies; I wouldn't watch Avatar again and the thought of 2 more of these films doesn't give me much excitement.

He could cut his budget and make something R-rated that doesn't have to appeal to every demographic on earth (and Pandora).

I enjoyed it more than I thought, but I went in with fairly low expectations. It's not a world which interests me greatly. I did cringe at certain parts of the script too. But you know Cameron will always push the technology and you can't argue with what he managed to do here. It was incredible. He's still the best director of action in my book.

This felt like an exercise to push the tech, supplamented by a story rather than the other way round. Cameron gets a harsher picking from me because we've seen what he's capable of.
 
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Mark Harris said:
Second biggest critique, and maybe it should be the first, was lack of any real fear for the characters. I felt a hundred-times more scared of Ripley being locked in the room with the crawling thing(a cheap piece of rubber on a string, mind you), than I felt of any monster in this movie(millions of dollars of man-hours behind a keyboard). Maybe that's because the crawler carries an insanely scary idea and these things just want to eat you. Maybe because, even though it's cheap rubber, it's a real thing in a real room with real people. But here, every time they ran from a monster, I looked at my watch. I never believed they were in danger.
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That would bother me more if this was supposed to be a horror movie, but it's not. It's an adventure film. I don't totally disagree with most of what you're saying, but I just can't bring myself to dislike this movie. Too much of it put a smile on my face.
 
Batutta said:
That would bother me more if this was supposed to be a horror movie, but it's not. It's an adventure film. I don't totally disagree with most of what you're saying, but I just can't bring myself to dislike this movie. Too much of it put a smile on my face.
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Yeah, I guess so. But to me it was symptomatic of a larger problem of just not getting emotionally involved. I mean, I know it's an action film. But in Die Hard, I honest-to-God never knew if John would make it through the next 5 minutes. I still get on the edge of my seat when I see it like the 10th time. This one I never felt any doubt of the outcome for a second.

And I will be the first to admit I am in the minority. I'm always on the losing side of films that are so broad-reaching in their audience grab, that to me they come up bland. So I have absolutely no problem with people digging it.

SPOILERS!!!!!














Though I was glad when Sigourney bought it. I was like: "Guys, throw me a bone here. Someone's got to get hurt at some point! Gimme some darkness up in this hizzie!"
 
Mark Harris said:
SPOILERS!!!!!














Though I was glad when Sigourney bought it. I was like: "Guys, throw me a bone here. Someone's got to get hurt at some point! Gimme some darkness up in this hizzie!"
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If they were going to add darkness I would have preferred they have at least ONE Na'vi who wasn't so noble. Native Americans routinely sold themselves out to their brothers, and much of the African slave trade was enabled by African kings and tribal leaders selling their own people to the white men.
 
mark harris said:
it was symptomatic of a larger problem of just not getting emotionally involved. I mean, i know it's an action film. But in die hard, i honest-to-god never knew if john would make it through the next 5 minutes. I still get on the edge of my seat when i see it like the 10th time. This one i never felt any doubt of the outcome for a second.
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+1
 
Batutta said:
If they were going to add darkness I would have preferred they have at least ONE Na'vi who wasn't so noble. Native Americans routinely sold themselves out to their brothers, and much of the African slave trade was enabled by African kings and tribal leaders selling their own people to the white men.
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I think that would have veered the story along a more cliche line. In these kinds of adventure movies there is ALWAYS one guy who thinks only of himself and sells everyone else out. I liked the fact that they all stood together despite their own personal doubts or beliefs and weren't in fact betrayed from within. The method of their destruction was all external and it was because of their choice to stand together and defend their homes. Not because of some schemer who realizes only too late his mistake and seeks redemption after the fact....
 
Rodney V. Smith said:
I think that would have veered the story along a more cliche line. In these kinds of adventure movies there is ALWAYS one guy who thinks only of himself and sells everyone else out. I liked the fact that they all stood together despite their own personal doubts or beliefs and weren't in fact betrayed from within. The method of their destruction was all external and it was because of their choice to stand together and defend their homes. Not because of some schemer who realizes only too late his mistake and seeks redemption after the fact....
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I'm not saying they had to go so far as to have one guy sell them out but, come on, there's always bad apples in the bunch. It's that lack of dimension (All Na'vi and everything about their culture is inherently good) that keeps the film from greatness for me.
 
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SPOILERS BELOW





They did have the potential for that kind of character in Tsu'Tey and he was adversarial to Sully all the way through (until he showed up to save the day). I was actually afraid they were going to take it all the way and make Tsu'Tey a traitor and I'm very glad they didn't. The one thing even the bad apples could agree on is the fact that the "aliens" were not to be trusted.
 
Rodney V. Smith said:
SPOILERS BELOW





They did have the potential for that kind of character in Tsu'Tey and he was adversarial to Sully all the way through (until he showed up to save the day). I was actually afraid they were going to take it all the way and make Tsu'Tey a traitor and I'm very glad they didn't. The one thing even the bad apples could agree on is the fact that the "aliens" were not to be trusted.
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Yeah, I'm just saying even something as black and white about the concept of evil as the Star Wars saga threw in characters like Han Solo and Lando Calrissian. All the characters line up too cleanly on one side of the line or the other in Avatar.
 
Batutta said:
Yeah, I'm just saying even something as black and white about the concept of evil as the Star Wars saga threw in characters like Han Solo and Lando Calrissian.
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The only thing that would have made sense in this case would have been another human who was a traitor... another marine in an Avatar, etc...

I don't think I would have bought a Na'vi helping the humans... to what end? What were they possibly going to offer him/her?

I don't know - I can see what you're saying, but I think it would have felt false.
The only way I could possibly see it working is if there were another human traitor.
 
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