Posted on 02/16/2010 9:56:20 AM PST by RobRoy
When Star Wars first came out, it was a quantum leap beyond anything I had ever seen in a theater before. I ended up watching it 26 times in the theater. I have not had that experience since - until today. In 3D and Imax, I saw Avatar.
Yes, I know the liberal "love the trees BS" message people say it has, but it is science fantasy. Sure, the parallels between the indigenous "people" of the planet and the American Indians and simple tribal cultures of planet earth and their various forms of nature worship were thick enough to cut with a knife. But...this was not earth. In this fantasy world, their beliefs were based on the reality of their world.
But the imagination of whoever created this story was truly appreciated by me. It was a visual extravaganza, and twisted in some very good and interesting ways, regarding how another world may be different in ways most of us never thought of. The political message was stupid, right down to their using the phrase "shock and awe" to describe the attack. But stripping away the ludicrous attempt at an over-simplified - and terribly wrongheaded - cultural parallel with our world, the movie was an amazing thing to behold.
It used CGI in subtle but incredibly effective was that, just as we have been told in various reviews of the movie, a true "next generation" application of the technology. Actually, it may have skipped a couple of generations.
I give credit where credit is due. There was not a boring moment in the film. The pace was fast, but not too fast. The story was compelling and there were very emotional moments in the film. It kept me interested for the entire 180 minutes. I would recommend it to anyone.
Ignore the "man is in the forest" nonsense and this will blow you away. Skip the popcorn and soda. You won't need it. Just sit back and prepare to almost literally enter another world - A world of incredible danger, beauty, and adventure, the memory of which you will carry for the rest of your life.
I thought I was the only one! The 6-limbed creatures/4-limbed humanoid thing bothered me for a few hours after the movie, too.
Gee, if we weren’t assaulted on every front with the “news” that liberals are so much smarter than conservatives, one might wonder if James Cameron didn’t know what the heck evolution was or why he believed in it...
I, myself, compared this to Pocahontas. The imagination I am speaking of is the visual world they occupy and the aspects that are not in Pocahontas. I saw the comparison of the two movies a few weeks ago. The story lines are very similar and, at a high level, typical of this sort of story.
As I mentioned earlier, it is even similar to Independence day.
Heck, where do you think the phrase “does the boy get the girl” come from? :)
>>The story is pretty much classic cowboys and indians with a twist.<<
...and one of the reasons I compared it to Star Wars. ;)
Warning!!!! Spoiler!!!
He saved a lot of lives. And an entire culture. From what I saw, the “planet” would have won in the end anyway. He accelerated the time line.
Spot-on, Rob.
This was an alien world that RELIES on the synergy between all forms of life—the trees, the animals, the people and their spirituality. It’s the lack of even attempting to understand this was the humans’ downfall.
It’s different here on Earth. Liberals’ attempts to make it so are THEIR downfall.
>>You saw “Dances with Blue Wolves”?<<
Yep. Except on this planet, the wolves were clearly in the right. Mind you, they were TOO perfect. They were actually more like sinless animals than people. Heck, they barely made tools. ‘Course, they didn’t need them. When they got sick or broke a leg they died, unless their “planet mother” healed them, which is always possible.
The rules on this planet and reality were completely different than in our world. The Planet Mother was real.
“We both can’t wait to take our 11-year-old son to experience this in IMAX 3-D.”
Is it ok for an 11 year old boy? I saw the revue on Pluggedinonline and it mentioned some sex scenes and virtual nudity....
>>The visuals were fantastic however the story seemed to be very close to “The Abyss”.<<
I’ll be frank: The story was like a LOT of stories. Heck, Star Wars was a western in space. So was Star Trek TOS. And look at all the chick films. I can sum them up as follows (and feel free to exchange the words “boy” and “girl”): Boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl back.
All stories have similarities to other stories. It is how art works. Artists build new bits of creativity from the creativity of those that went before them. After a decade or century, you may have something barely attached to the original creative root.
I expect story similarites, but good stories have their own unique twist on the “expected”. Avatar did that several times.
There is no doubt the CGI is amazing, and the story is lower than sophomoric.
>>I sure hope you’ve found a girl friend since then.<<
;)
Yeah, I would actually sit and watch it three times through sometimes. It was a very brief divergence from my “normal” life. :)
And no, I’ve never dressed in costume, etc. I was over it by the second movie, which I only saw once in the theater, though I really enjoyed it.
Star Wars was a truly unique event in movie history, on several levels.
Riddle me this, why in all those chick movies, when boy loses girl, girl gets another boy or sleeps around, but boy remains loyal to idea of the love lost until he finds her again?
Not remotely realistic, but hey, I guess chicks want their cake and eat it to.
>>I don’t remember ever being so immersed in a film that I forgot I was sitting in a theater.<<
That’s the money line for me. It was what I was getting at when I said you don’t need soda and popcorn.
WOW! This is the only movie in my entire life that I have paid to see twice. Only the fact that humans are all wired differently can explain those who did not like it. We all have different tastes.
I have a very short political trigger and it did not go off at all because the movie was so good.
The concept of a living “network” in the plant and animal life is intriguing. I loved the name of the valuable element. It reminded me of Rocky, Bullwinkle, Boris & Natasha and "upsidaysium" (sp?)
>>I was rooting for the colonel dude in the walking robot at the end. <<
If it was on earth, I would have been too. But looking at it from the reality created by the movie, they needed to leave the planet alone. They were very much like the aliens in Independence Day. The good guys won there too.
I noticed that six legged thing too. Since my paradigm considers creation as opposed to evolution, I just ran with it. The six legs are the low hanging fruit. There were many other inconsistencies as well. I get used to ignoring that when reading fiction as long as it is not too relevant.
I call chick films “science fiction for women”.
>>It reminded me of Rocky, Bullwinkle, Boris & Natasha and “upsidaysium” (sp?)<<
HAHAHA! ME TOO! I actually cracked up in the theater when they mentioned the name.
I was the only one. :)
“Is it ok for an 11 year old boy? I saw the revue on Pluggedinonline and it mentioned some sex scenes and virtual nudity....”
If you call an embrace “sex.” The nudity was just natural a la native’s in a National Geographic. If you’re there to look for little blue nipples, you’ll see some. But nothing was overtly sexualized.
I would be more concerned with some of the virtual scary creatures, but knowing some of the other fantasy films we’ve let him see, I’m sure he can handle this.
>> they needed to leave the planet alone
But it had great quantities of unobtanium that needed exploiting! Are you a capitalist, or are you one ‘a them socialists or what?
I’m kidding about rooting for the colonel BTW. Although you had to hand it to whoever build those robot things — they could sure take the damage!
I didn’t like the plot because it was shallow and cliche.
That’s just my 2c. But I will say the concept and execution were superb, and frankly the acting was top notch too. Sigourney Weaver was outstanding, for instance.
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