Shenanigans & Tomfoolery

Well over a decade in the making, Avatar is James Cameron’s first feature film since Titanic back in 1997. In my mind, Cameron’s Terminator 2 is the best action movie ever made so this movie had some pretty big shoes to fill. I tried to stay away from details of the movie for as long as I could but some things are inevitably bound to slip by and what I heard about Avatar was a little mixed to say the least. “Dances with Smurfs” and “Star Wars for a new generation” sit at opposite ends of the spectrum in this regard.

I saw Avatar last night and below are my thoughts on it.

Before I sing praises to James Cameron’s filmmaking, let’s get the ugly out of the way: Avatar is predictable and cliché. The story of a person from one culture sent to investigate another and ultimately falling for the customs of the latter and fighting against the former has been told many, many times before and Avatar does little to mix things up. It’s also for this very reason that the movie becomes predictable because you know what’s going to happen to the story and its characters. This is not a story that’s going to surprise you with its simple plot twists and cookie cutter characters.

Nonetheless (and this is where I start gushing), an old story can feel new if told in an interesting way and this is absolutely true for Avatar. The fantasy world of Pandora is fully realized and nothing short of enthralling. The flora and fauna on display here is unique amongst films and the way this contrasts with the more mechanical science fiction elements in the movie is but one of the many ways in which this film succeeds visually. The much lauded 3D effects take only a few minutes to completely get used to and gives this movie an almost tactile element that adds a lot to the experience. It’s a successful feature because it’s distracting only in the rarest of occasions. The motion-capture performances can be extremely subtle at times and the CGI in general is of great quality and raise the bar relative to what’s been done before.

Of course, all this would amount to little but talking pretty blue giants without James Cameron’s masterful direction. Sure, the story is predictable but Cameron stacks the odds against our heroes so high that you can’t help but be constantly at the edge of your seat and the final conflict is so massive, so epic and so masterfully shot that that it puts just about every other action movie I’ve seen in the last ten years to complete shame. James Cameron is an absolute master of his craft and his ability to generate this tremendous excitement in his films is unparalleled. His twelve or so years away from feature films have done nothing to dent this man’s talent and I’m truly thrilled that he’s back in the director’s seat.

So yeah, go out and see this movie. It’s a story you’ve already seen but you’ve never seen it like this before, I assure you. I wouldn’t throw the phrase “visual tour de force” around haphazardly but this film more than any other I’ve seen in recent memory deserves that moniker.  There are some clear allegories in the film regarding contemporary issues and, indeed, some larger issues with humanity as a whole but this sits comfortably in the background of the film and is never knocked over your head. I can’t get myself to call this James Cameron’s greatest work only because of the lackluster story but Avatar is still as amazing as any other movie he’s made.

This is why I go to the movies.