By Jay Shenk
About a month ago I visited the MIT museum with my nine year old son. His favorite exhibit hall included machines that performed pointless but intricate ‘works of modern art’, while his second favorite (and my favorite) exhibits were the holograms—there were some pictures hanging on the wall that were incredible--the pictures weren’t just 3D inside the frame, but also seemed to stretch out from the frame and hang mid air in front of you.
I didn’t expect that sort of effects from Avatar, particularly since we had to wear some funky glasses which, since I was already wearing glasses, made it likely I’d barely be able to see the screen leave alone experience any 3D effects. My skepticism was heightened by some cartoon billed as 3D that was shown during last year's Super Bowl, which was very disappointing to our crowd of young kids gathered to watch, plus, during the extended period of time sitting in the theatre waiting for the previews to start, I’d flip the glasses down, look around in the dimly lit room, and notice nothing different except that everything looked exceptionally unclear and foggy.
Optimism over the upcoming movie took a step forward when the preview of a new Shrek was shown, a cartoon produced in 3D. We had our glasses on at this point, and sure enough, the 3D effects were quite remarkable, in fact maybe even a little overdone, as the cartoon characters were definitely in 3D but yet still looked flat, so you saw the characters on different planes, but without the impression of actually looking at the real world.
Then Avatar started. As my nine year old leaned over to whisper to me more than a few times, “this is the best movie I’ve ever seen”, and I’d have to concur on at least the ‘blockbuster movie level’—the special effects were absolutely and completely stunning, and at this—producing a setting based on a science fiction or a fantasy world, we’ve just reached a new level. The 3D effects, combined with very good technical film making, produced a world, Pandora, and characters—the Na’vi, that looked as real as anything you’d see outside the theatre, except of course that the main characters were 10 feet tall and bluish, and the world consisted of huge trees, flying reptilian looking creatures, floating mountains, and many other things that previoulsy had existed only in someone’s imagination.
This film doesn’t get an A+ in every category, and in fact I give it a big "F" in one particular category, but overall the pluses outweigh the minuses. For instance, the plot is pretty simplistic, with the usual bad guys and love story, albeit humans were mainly the bad guys and the love story took place between strange looking, ten foot tall humanoids. To the extent it mattered, there were a lot of stereotypes—the bad corporate executive who explicitly puts the financial statement above the 'bad press' of killing the inhabitants (he actually says that, so that even the youngest person in the audience gets the point), the tough Marine Sergeant who is straight out of Heart of Darkness, and the Na’vi themselves, based loosely on an idealized vision of the American Indians before the Europeans showed up to take their lands. In fact, that is pretty much the plot, except that the natives of Pandora are smarter, faster, and bigger than the white people coming to conquer; they have a god (Mother Nature by another name) who actually chips in and helps, and in the end...you'll have to go see it.
There even is a precious metal called “Unobtainium” (boy, that’s subtle!) which is analogous to the gold that some of our ancestors pursued to kick the Indians out of their many sacred places, such as the Black Hills.
There is also a ‘have it both ways’ presentation of the Marines (“at home they are protecting our freedom, but out here just hired guns for the corporation”), which makes them both good and bad guys, which is the one area where the movie fails miserably. The bad guys are US Marines (that's not explicitly stated, but you know they are) and since I was watching the movie with my oldest son, who along with my middle son is a Marine, that made this particular bit of blatant anti-Americanism stand out. There's no reason other than politics and an eye towards the international box office that the bad guys doing all the bad things to the indigenous people had to be US soldiers--they could have been nondescript, or multi-national, or anything but US soldiers, because the flow of the movie made it so the audience was hoping and cheering for Americans to be killed. The injection of those political beliefs into a film that is viewable by young, impressionable minds is pretty low, to say nothing of hypocritical since the movie is funded by a major US corporation, our armed forces allow movies like this to be made, and quite frankly, the anti-Americanism will sell like hotcakes on the International market, and this movie had a lot of expenses to earn back (putting the balance sheet ahead of morality, as the evil corporate person said in the movie).
Strangely however, the movie is not anti-fighting or warfare, since the only reason the main character, Jake Sully, an ex-Marine, is accepted by the Na’vi is because he is a “warrior” and not just a scientist, as the other Avatars had been. It's anti-American but not anti-violence.
There was an environmental message as well—apparently in this future our Earth had no green left, which was what was driving us into space, and the Na’vi had to prevent us killing off their world as we’d done to our own.
Lastly in terms of both major and minor complaints, I found the setting derivative of the Hyperion books by Dan Simmons, in particular the floating mountains and giant, sacred trees.
However, I really enjoyed the movie. My problem with all of the above (except having young people hope for US Marines to be killed) isn’t that I disagree with it; rather, the themes were so blatantly obvious it was like being hit over the head with them. But considering that this film has to appeal to as many people as possible (it supposedly had a budget in the $450-600MM range), the 'obviousness' is understandable, and to be honest, it really didn’t detract much from the film--The special effects were far and away the main draw, the characters were well done, the film making was impeccable, and who wouldn’t root for Mother Nature and people defending their own lands from alien invaders. I thought it was really a good touch that humans were portrayed the way aliens usually are in films where the earth is attacked—we looked very out of place on Pandora.
If you can get past the politics, I’d say everyone should see this film, even including my wife, who hates science fiction and doesn’t like going to movies, except for one thing: the movie is nearly three hours long, so the wonder of the special effects might wear off if you can’t enjoy the plot too. Other than that, go see it—it’s the start of a new era in filmmaking. James Cameron, the producer, is an autocratic perfectionist, and it showed in this film. It most likely turned out exactly how he wanted it. He has the Na’vi perfectly done—certainly alien, but not so alien you can’t relate to the love affair—they are humanoid, which is probably unlikely were we to find other life forms in outer space, but how many in the audience could relate to a love affair between squid, for instance.
The world of Pandora is beautiful and believable, and also scary, particularly in 3D when crossing huge vines across deep crevices and that sort of thing. The plot also lends itself well to 3D effects—in the beginning there are space ship and space station scenes, then there is the part of the film where Jake Sully learns to be a Na’vi, and finally, there is the climactic battle for the planet, all of which make great use of 3D without being gratuitous.
All in all, a “must see in 3D”. We’re most likely going to see it again, this time at an Imax theatre, which for planning purposes, it's worth noting that IMAX theatres have been sold out completely since this film opened.