Seven years between Alien and Aliens as well.
So at least Cameron has a lot of experience with doing a late follow-up of a popular movie
Avatar - biggest movie, least impact?
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Seven years between Alien and Aliens as well.
So at least Cameron has a lot of experience with doing a late follow-up of a popular movie
Agree.
Avatar is among my favourites. Would rather call if a favourite thing than a favourite film, but it's still up there. I've seen it almost as much as The Matrix and Star Trek from 2009 - if it wasn't so difficult to sit through, I would have seen it more.
It's the only thing ever to actually depict a complete alien biosphere, and do so in startling detail. And the only way I know of to make you really feel you're on a different inhabited planet. It's the closest thing we have to that, for better or for worse. I hope James Cameron does something good with the sequels, especially crank up the storyline at least a little.
The world it shows is a little too similar to Earth, but what it loses in similarity it makes up in going a little bit far in the fantasy department. Maybe too far, it's almost a fairy tale fulfilling childhood fantasies like floating islands, but shockingly, even that remains mostly within the limits of the laws of physics. Which is also amazing, because what you see on the screen is unquestionably impossible, yet a serious reflection afterwards makes you realise it technically could happen, more or less. That still leaves it a great visual extrapolation of what exciting thing may actually lie somewhere in the universe – it's probably far far from any reality, perhaps being too shy and too bold at the same time, but it's a step in the right direction in the way to imagine things, and to show them. For that reason, I hope it has impact.
It's the polar opposite of Star Trek, where all the magic in the universe has been summoned and turned into nonsensical technobable, but that is seldom used to actually take you to a place that's as exciting... even storywise, because obviously the budget wouldn't allow visual trips to anywhere other than dressed up Earth. Many of the Star Trek stories did use the magic to its full potential and still blow my mind, but that tends to happen when you have almost a thousand episodes.
It's the only thing ever to actually depict a complete alien biosphere, and do so in startling detail. And the only way I know of to make you really feel you're on a different inhabited planet. It's the closest thing we have to that, for better or for worse. I hope James Cameron does something good with the sequels, especially crank up the storyline at least a little.
The world it shows is a little too similar to Earth, but what it loses in similarity it makes up in going a little bit far in the fantasy department. Maybe too far, it's almost a fairy tale fulfilling childhood fantasies like floating islands, but shockingly, even that remains mostly within the limits of the laws of physics. Which is also amazing, because what you see on the screen is unquestionably impossible, yet a serious reflection afterwards makes you realise it technically could happen, more or less. That still leaves it a great visual extrapolation of what exciting thing may actually lie somewhere in the universe – it's probably far far from any reality, perhaps being too shy and too bold at the same time, but it's a step in the right direction in the way to imagine things, and to show them. For that reason, I hope it has impact.
It's the polar opposite of Star Trek, where all the magic in the universe has been summoned and turned into nonsensical technobable, but that is seldom used to actually take you to a place that's as exciting... even storywise, because obviously the budget wouldn't allow visual trips to anywhere other than dressed up Earth. Many of the Star Trek stories did use the magic to its full potential and still blow my mind, but that tends to happen when you have almost a thousand episodes.
As others have pointed out, Avatar's impact had more to do with the world it introduced as well as the alien culture, both of which seemed so real. No, the movie didn't provide a bunch of catchphrases. what it had was an iconic world that of course, exists in images and not words.
But just because the movie didn't leave a bunch of catchphrases doesn't mean it left no imprint.
Sam Worthington was a problem, I thought. No charisma. Zoe stole the movie from him.
Well, storywise Avatar has essentially the same theme and plot a ST: Insurrection
Avatar tapped into the escape fantasies of people who are stressed out by an overly complicated modern life. That's the part of the movie that emotionally resonates with people, not the characters or the story.
In terms of the film's cultural footprint, Avatar was less parodied in the year it came out than Star Wars is in an average year. People aren't speculating when we'll be able to project our consciousness into a virtual body, it hasn't created the scientific progress benchmarks of Star Trek. If you ask a random person 'Draw an alien', they probably draw a classic grayhead, the Alien alien, or something from Star Trek or Star Wars, not a Na'vi.
In terms of the film's cultural footprint, Avatar was less parodied in the year it came out than Star Wars is in an average year. People aren't speculating when we'll be able to project our consciousness into a virtual body, it hasn't created the scientific progress benchmarks of Star Trek. If you ask a random person 'Draw an alien', they probably draw a classic grayhead, the Alien alien, or something from Star Trek or Star Wars, not a Na'vi.
It could be that there's a way to do HFR well that the Hobbit movies did not hit upon.
Oh yes they are.
Oh yes they are.
It could be that there's a way to do HFR well that the Hobbit movies did not hit upon.
Oh yes they are.
Hell, I am supposed to be in a conscious body right now, and half the time I can't tell!
Yeah, but they failed. Perhaps James Cameron can figure out a way to do it in a way that appeals to people. Avatar wasn't the first 3-D movie that year - that would actually be a U2 concert followed by Journey to the Center of the Earth. However, it did 3-D so well that it gets the credit for starting the 3D craze.
The problem with the way Hobbit used HFR is that the sets which look totally fine in normal frame rate looked really fake without the cinema magic.
It was odd at the time that everyone was acting like it was the first 3D movie ever. No one even noticed how well Coraline used 3D 8 months earlier. Journey was actually over a year earlier, and Beowulf almost 2.
If anything I'm going to blame Avatar for starting the craze of 2D conversions and pretty much killing off 3D. Avatar 2 better reignite some passion for it. I got a 3D TV with nothing to watch.
Not the first 3D movie ever, no. But Cameron did develop new 3D cameras and techniques to film it in such a way that was more natural, which is why it was hyped up so much over those others you list.
It was odd at the time that everyone was acting like it was the first 3D movie ever. No one even noticed how well Coraline used 3D 8 months earlier. Journey was actually over a year earlier, and Beowulf almost 2.
If anything I'm going to blame Avatar for starting the craze of 2D conversions and pretty much killing off 3D. Avatar 2 better reignite some passion for it. I got a 3D TV with nothing to watch.
There is a Country-Western song in there, som'ers!
(...with apologies to Dolly and whoever wrote "9-5"!)
Blamin' Avatar
They done chased off all the 3-D
Namin' Avatar
It got ' credit, should be "Coraline"!
Flamin' Avatar
'Cause, conversions of the 2-D
Gamin, Avatar
Ole' Magellan got a TV
Lame old Avatar
No good shows for M t'be seein'
Callin' Cameron
Mehbee he'll buy back the M screen...
Well, yeah, because they had already done that that after The Matrix, which the virtual body parts seemed to be stolen from. Even Jake facing big guy mecha suit guy felt like Neo's face-off with Agent Smith rehashed, even if it was scripted completely differently. It seemed so similar in places that I rejoiced every time someone was on both sides of being plugged in, even though that made absolutely no sense since there were no two sides or virtual worlds.
So to hide the fact that it was 1:1 rehash of the plot of District 9 James Cameron made The Matrix play simultaneously with it to mislead you.
Aliens possessing a hive-mind are getting oppressed and belittled by humans. Random clueless guy gets sent there by big military guy who wants to subdue the aliens further. Said clueless guy finds himself in the middle of it, and gets reasons to question his allegiance. It goes so far that after an unexpected DNA-based solution, he eventually becomes one of the aliens, physically. But not before facing off with military big guy in a mecha suit. In the end it all boils down to just a love story gone wrong, obstructed by the double-allegiance of our unlikely hero.
If they didn't get in and out of the Matrix all the time, you'd notice it!
If they didn't get in and out of the Matrix all the time, you'd notice it!
That's completely unfair... The conversion craze started due to the success of Alice in Wonderland, and was then quickly taken to absurdity by the terrible Wrath of the Titans.
I agree. Avatar did reinvent the 3D filming process and even developed new technologies in order to do it.
Looking over Cameron's career, he does have a number of memorable films but his true legacy is all the technologies and techniques that were advanced or even invented in the making of his movies. The underwater camera techniques in Abyss, the CGI in Terminator 2, etc.
You know, I was going to make some quip ot the effect of "so you're saying he's a Canadian George Lucas?"
But then it occurred to me that the special editions of Cameron's films are actually improvements over the originals...also, he can direct actors.
You know, I was going to make some quip ot the effect of "so you're saying he's a Canadian George Lucas?"
But then it occurred to me that the special editions of Cameron's films are actually improvements over the originals...also, he can direct actors.
I wasn't really thinking of the special editions, i was thinking more along the lines of how things that he originally did for his films seeped into culture. One major example was the morphing effect from Terminator II. At the time that was a new effect that nobody had seen before and within a year it was in everything from music videos to television ads.
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