I went to see Avatar on New Year’s Day. It was just awful–ludicrously, unintentionally-comically awful. The story was insufferable, making a clumsy parallel with the War in Iraq, just as you commenters who saw it reported. James Cameron had the idea for this movie for years, we are told, and back then in his circles our conflict in Iraq was all about the evil President Bush and how we were just fighting the war over oil. I wonder if Mr. Cameron sees the war in the same way now that President Obama is fighting it. I would just say that the movie’s portrayal of our military men as cartoon villains is unconscionable. The movie is proof that parts of our society are quite ready to villainize our Iraq and Afghanistan veterans as was done to our Vietnam veterans. It’s also interesting to see how this mindset apparently thinks of our adversaries: as simple, virtuous noble savages with no gender role differences.
But this political theme, along with the radical environmentalism and pantheistic religiosity, is not what makes this a bad movie. It is possible to portray liberalism, environmentalism, and pantheism with subtlety, complexity, and creativity.
Avatar, on the contrary, is stereotyped, cliched, predictable, preachy, sappy, and (ironically) one-dimensional. The characters are superficial, the dialogue is laughable, and there is absolutely no irony, wit, or self-awareness.
Visually, though, the movie is fun to watch. The cinematography, the computer effects, the editing, and the visual spectacle are impressive.
As for the 3-D, which I was eagerly anticipating, I was underwhelmed. The technology is an improvement over the old cardboard glasses with the red and blue cellophane, but it’s not much different from that. You still have to wear glasses–these have some kind of polarized lenses–and it’s still based on the same optical illusion made possible by our having two eyes side by side. What we see is nothing like a hologram, with fully molded 3-D figures, just a heightened foreground and objects that appear to float towards the viewer. I’m sure the technology will get better. The previews featured several upcoming 3-D movies, mostly if not all from Disney, including the new Shrek. But in Avatar, though it was the most appealing part of the movie, the 3-D elements failed to produce the sense of wonder and amazement that the movie desperately needed.
Other than that, I really enjoyed it.
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