Avatar; Max's review

Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me,
I'm not sleepy and there is no place I'm going to.
Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me,
In the jingle jangle morning I'll come followin' you.

May contain spoilers!

In two words, the thing was darn good. Given that the original thought processes for the film first came about about 14 years ago it could hardly have been an epic flop. Being headed by James Cameron is always a plus, and the $310m budget probably helped it along too. I had the pleasure also of seeing it in 3d at the IMAX cinema (for the clarity of those not in the know, IMAX is a cinema with a screen the height of a 9-storey building; lots of people have just gazed at me blankly when I've mentioned it in the past). The combination of a world that stretches into your peripheral vision with lots of flying 3d things at 10 in the morning is possibly the worst hangover cure in existence. Its a credit to the film that I still enjoyed it so much.



The plot: The year is 2154 and humans are building a heavily armed mining colony on a planet called Pandora, presumably lightyears away. They face resistance from the humanoid natives, the Navi, who are the blue guys from the trailers and posters. The story follows Jake Sully, who's name for me is sadly still synonymous with the big blue guy from Monsters, Inc, which can be offputting at times. He's a paraplegic ex-marine who takes the place of his dead twin brother on the Avatar programme, which places a human mind into a Navi body, allowing them to make contact with the natives and try and win hearts and minds. Unfortunately for the humans, Sully goes rogue after being rescued by a native called Neytiri, and he goes under her wing to learn the ways of the natives, in kind of neo-Tarzan-and-Jane-esque sequences that were one of my only very minor criticisms. She is also weirdly attractive given that she's effectively a combination of Pocahontas and Jar Jar Binks.

On the left, for sexually ambiguous clarification

That's a pretty major point actually. Nothing in the trailers gave away the fact that the Navi are much, much bigger than the humans, yet again tall and ridiculously skinny to the point of appearing anorexic occasionally. Why are we still glorifying aliens who are tall and skinny; the plotline could have had a huge amount of comedy value added if they were a race of short, fat lumbering things. They'll probably make it onto the cover of Vanity Fair with their current appearance. So they're the good guys. The bad guys are first and foremost the humans; more specifically, the military, whose believeable portrayal ought to have a few resounding effects among military circles. The soldiers are led by the batshit crazy Colonel Quaritch, who looks and acts like a psychotic GI Joe doll, and the twattish bureaucratic corporation leader played brilliantly by Giovanni Ribisi, who was such a villainous bastard that you just want to slam his head into a desk over and over.

Gunships and floating mountains. Sweet.

The final third of the film is taken up pretty much entirely by a single action sequence, much like District 9, except with less fookin' prawns and more dragony creatures. The big mech suits are still there though. Ultimately, the whole thing is very effective; not only is it a great finishing sequence, but you don't find yourself wondering when the hell its going to end. Everything that appeared previously in the film - vehicles, plants, animals- all come out and display their wondrous capabilities. The latter 2 are cool because they seem carefully considered - nothing feels weird for weirds sake, like the Star Wars cantina. Being James Cameron, theres inevitably forbidden love, but not even that bothered me, because this time around its weird and beautiful - its not dictated by time difference like in Terminator, or by class like Titanic. Its inter-dimensional love and it makes you fuzzy inside.



Its well worth seeing. The posters may look like a live action Ferngully, but its actually very, very good. Get down to your nearest IMAX.