I don't care how many people liked it, it still sucked.
James Cameron's "Avatar" (grading and discussion)
- Thread starter chrisspringob
- Start date
Everyone is entitled to their opinions. You didn't like it that's fine. I did, and that is fine too.
The Pandorapedia and other sources (like the Human Hardware video featurette) make it clear that the intense magnetic fields on Pandora make it necessary to use relatively low-tech weapons and machines.
They are also limited by what the can manufacture on-site. Since the starships only can bring 330 metric tons of cargo per trip, almost all of their machinery is built by generic fabrication facilities using locally mined resources. The Samson and Scorpion gunships are about the maximum level of technology that they can manufacture on-site.
The Samson and Scorpion gunships have long been abandoned on Earth - where much more advanced tech and weapons are available.
Box Office Mojo has Avatar at 25.2 million for New Years Day so it's at just over 309 million after 15 days, WOW.
Since so many people were comparing it to Dune(1984), I re-watched it recently, a great movie with some good actors.
Patrick Stewart before he was Picard is awesome too.
Dune, Dances with Wolves, The Last Samurai all have a similar theme and since I like them all and can re-watch them no problem without getting bored, the excuse that Avatar has a used plot doesn't matter one bit to me. In my opinion it doesn't hurt this movie at all.
I guess if you don't really like those types of movies then the plot wouldn't really appeal to you. Either that or you are just tired of that plot type of movie.
Since so many people were comparing it to Dune(1984), I re-watched it recently, a great movie with some good actors.
Patrick Stewart before he was Picard is awesome too.
Dune, Dances with Wolves, The Last Samurai all have a similar theme and since I like them all and can re-watch them no problem without getting bored, the excuse that Avatar has a used plot doesn't matter one bit to me. In my opinion it doesn't hurt this movie at all.
I guess if you don't really like those types of movies then the plot wouldn't really appeal to you. Either that or you are just tired of that plot type of movie.
I think overall it is better to stick with projectile weapons visually. To use lasers and so on tends to "soften" the portrayal of military forces which for a film like Avatar would really not work.
Did...did we see the same movie?
Presumably we've both seen Avatar, but I'm not sure that we've both seen environmentalists vs. industry movies. The latter seem to feature a hero (journalist, lawyer, decent hardworking government official) who is confronted with either a wild eyed poor person claiming they or their loved ones were poisoned by pollution, or by a crime committed to cover up the pollution. And the movie basically ends when the proof of the pollution is presented in the proper venue, a court, or the news media, or the proper authorities.
The last one I saw was Silver City, where Chris Cooper snags a dead body killed in the pollution coverup. The one before that I think was I Witness, with pollution in Mexico, which also started with bodies killed to cover up the pollution. And, going back to another movie with mystic Indian stuff, Thunderheart, that wasn't just mystic Indian stuff, it was, wait for it, about a pollution coverup. And it ended with the public exposure of the pollution. No coverup in Avatar, therefore a cliche of environmentalists vs. industry movies left unused.
interesting premise... they then had the capability to fix, rearm and remanufacture more ammo.
maybe even manufacture minor weapons.
Did...did we see the same movie?
Presumably we've both seen Avatar, but I'm not sure that we've both seen environmentalists vs. industry movies. The latter seem to feature a hero (journalist, lawyer, decent hardworking government official) who is confronted with either a wild eyed poor person claiming they or their loved ones were poisoned by pollution, or by a crime committed to cover up the pollution. And the movie basically ends when the proof of the pollution is presented in the proper venue, a court, or the news media, or the proper authorities.
The last one I saw was Silver City, where Chris Cooper snags a dead body killed in the pollution coverup. The one before that I think was I Witness, with pollution in Mexico, which also started with bodies killed to cover up the pollution. And, going back to another movie with mystic Indian stuff, Thunderheart, that wasn't just mystic Indian stuff, it was, wait for it, about a pollution coverup. And it ended with the public exposure of the pollution. No coverup in Avatar, therefore a cliche of environmentalists vs. industry movies left unused.
Another movie that comes to mind that fits that trope would be the Travolta vehicle A Civic Action. Since my parents, both environmental engineers, found it laughable, I haven't bothered to return to it, but my vague memories of the plot fit the formula you've outlined.
Thespeckledkiwi
Vice Admiral
Did...did we see the same movie?
I didn't have a problem with the moral of the movie. Just the heavy-handed, uninteresting storytelling. All that was missing was a shot of the chief with a tear rolling down his cheek as he looks at trash left behind by RDA Corp.
Pretty good sum up of this movie.
My other biggest problem is the...lack of any acting. There was absolutely no acting in this movie.
So it was a documentary on 10 foot tall blue aliens and the men who love them?
Don't feed the troll, Locotus.
Thespeckledkiwi has a history of making absurd points in this thread.
(such as no story, no conflict, no drama, and now no acting) He's just bored again.
http://www.deadline.com/hollywood/
Code:
[URL="http://www.deadline.com/hollywood/new-years-day-another-big-avatar-payday-the-blind-side-crosses-200m-domestic/"]CAMERON'S BILLION DOLLAR BABY! 'Avatar' [/URL]
[URL="http://www.deadline.com/hollywood/new-years-day-another-big-avatar-payday-the-blind-side-crosses-200m-domestic/"]Passes $1B Worldwide And $350M Domestic After Only [/URL]
[URL="http://www.deadline.com/hollywood/new-years-day-another-big-avatar-payday-the-blind-side-crosses-200m-domestic/"]17 Days In Release[/URL]
By [URL="http://www.deadline.com/hollywood/"]Nikki Finke[/URL] | Category: [URL="http://www.deadline.com/category/uncategorized"]Uncategorized[/URL] |
Saturday January 2, 2010 @ 10:15pm
SATURDAY PM/SUNDAY AM UPDATE: My sources say
early numbers show Avatar's projected North
American cume, after only 17 days in release from
20th Century Fox, will be $350.5 million. And its
worldwide box office figure should be $1.05 billion
coming out of this weekend. Yikes! Then again,
James Cameron's big budget technopic was helped
by higher 3D ticket prices. As a Fox exec just
gushed to me: "Mr. Cameron was king of the
world but now has dominion over the universe.
And he will own the top two slots on the worldwide
all-time box office list!"
Don't feed the troll, Locotus.
Thespeckledkiwi has a history of making absurd points in this thread.
So, basically... there was no movie.
Don't feed the troll, Locotus.
Thespeckledkiwi has a history of making absurd points in this thread.
Tsk, tsk .....that's why God made moderators, so it's best to leave such investigations to them.
Yes, that's another one. Again, the point is that it simply isn't true that Avatar leaves no cliche unused. Galleywest may have meant to be hyperbolic, I suppose.
And the rebuttal is over literal.
But, consider the people in the thread who changed the movie in their reviews, saying Jake the white guy saved the Indians, so they can argue the movie is racist. Since Eywa's magical intervention clearly saves the day, the only valid criticism of Avatar is that is arbitrarily (i.e., uses really crap fictional science) posits a Religion That Works.
Except, not only is religion deemed off limits for polite criticism, it is unlikely that it is the aspect that is "boring" or offensive.
Also, the most blatantly racist thing in the movie is the insane claim that the soldiers while on Earth were fighters for freedom. But no one even appeared to notice, much less object!
So, sorry folks, I don't think clubbing with facts the claim that Avatar left unused no cliche from "environmentalist vs. industry" movies is overkill.
The fact that Avatar is so successful is just mind-blowing. James Cameron must feel pretty awesome right about now.
He's king of two worlds now.
Someone's gotta' find an appropriate picture of Cameron to make one of those "I'm sorry, I can't hear you over the sound of how awesome I am" posters.
This one perhaps;
http://www.boxofficemojo.com/img/a/avatar/A-35450.jpg
This one perhaps;
http://www.boxofficemojo.com/img/a/avatar/A-35450.jpg
I hope he's having a lot of sex right about now.