This is for all Pocahontas in space-lovers 
:
I don't actually care too much if the plot is a ripoff or not. I've seen Pocahontas a million times and Avatar still seemed fresh to me. Partly it's thanks to the great visuals, which really make Pandora so wonderful looking place.
And com'on even Departed got four Oscars and it was basically the same movie as Infernal Affairs.
@The:
People who are saying that this is the best movie they've ever seen/of the decade/of the year don't know what they're talking about/haven't seen many movies.
Finding this best Movie of 2009 isn't odd as it sets the benchmark for Computer graphics.
3d is the way forward, although it definitely needs ironing out.
Good graphics a good movie does NOT MAKE. If anything, this is ALL this movie proves. No, scratch that, this movie proves that if it JUST has good graphics then this is the best movie ever.
FUCK THAT. Why couldn't Cameron have used his technology for a movie with a better plot?
And Greg's right in the aspect that the humans weren't believable. There's no way in heck that not ONE of those people wouldn't have brought up the native americans being in the EXACT same situation. I found their arguments to be….. to simple for someone whose fighting for LIVES.
I've always wondered though, why, if they had the drills, didn't they just go underground around the people and get it?
@The:
People who are saying that this is the best movie they've ever seen/of the decade/of the year don't know what they're talking about/haven't seen many movies.
And what are the best movies of the year, anyway? Besides this movie of course .
And what are the movies best of the year, anyway? Besides this movie of course
I'd say One Piece Strong World (even though I haven't seen it) 
Saw it today…
I have to say, this was the best movie Ive seen in cinemas this year, helll even in this decade!
I heard from a friend that the animation was fantastic, but the story was lacking.
He said it was similar to the IRL Spanish invasion of South America?
How true is this?
I'd say One Piece Strong World (even though I haven't seen it)
Now that you mention it, does Strong World deserved its hype (being one of the top selling movies in Japan this year)? I don't think the story was as good as some of the Miyazaki movie (not referring to Strong World beating Ponyo ticket sales of course). Strong World's story doesn't have much depth in it like most of Miyazaki movie does but, perhaps Volume 0 are the main reason that attracts the moviegoers? The situation are pretty much the same as Avatar movie. Avatar's story is so-so but the visual attract the moviegoers.
I think what matters is if the movie are entertaining or enjoyable to the audience, not how complex, intricate, and original the story is. In Avatar's case, it gets its hype because of the visual effect, and most people enjoy that aspect so I don't really see any problem there. The story, eventhough its been done hundreds time before, is still a good story to me. I guess people just dislike the movie because of the hypes its getting so they complaints about the movie didn't deserve the hype claiming the story didn't brought anything new to the film industry.
The problem ISN'T the fact that its a story thats been told a thousand times. I mean, its a genuine recurring historical event. And a good retelling of a classic story… is good. And the movie did oh, 70% of it SO well.
The problem is that it was told blandly and with one dimensional characters that had no depth or nuance that were jerks... mostly for the sake of being jerks.
The worst part is, the very end of the movie had the tagline that apparently, Earth was pretty much dead and this was their only hope. If that had been incorporated into the movie just a little more, with say... 2 lines. If every single damn soldier hadn't been AMAZINGLY gung-ho about going off and killing things. (Yeah, its nice that pilot chick turned sides, but she was the only one.) 2 lines before the battle, a slightly different speech than what was given. It would have made a huge difference.
"Sir? Is this right? They are the natives. I think we might be in the wrong about this…"
"No solidier, its not easy. But we must have that unobtanium, or else every man, woman and child on earth will die. I lost my sister to the plauge, and I won't let anyone else die. We tried peace for as long as we could, have wasted YEARS while people back home die, and they have left us no other choice. We'll have to take it by force. For the future of everyone you ever loved, ever will love, and all the generations to come. We must do this."
Except then of course, it wouldn't be a happy feel good ending when Jake turned traitor and started killing his own kind and underwent a magic soul transfusion at the end and doomed all of Earth to... some sort of "dying" fate. You would have wondered if he did the right thing, if it was okay to actually root for him. Instead it was just a ho hum "greed and deforestation is bad" spiel that Captain Planet could have given us.
Seriously. 30 seconds. A slightly different speech. Completely different movie with instantly more depth and complexity and more than one side to it.
I just don't get it. Like with Transformers, people seem to be so impressed with the graphics. "Story was a little corny but it looked amazing bro!" The graphics of a movie. Who cares? How do cutting edge graphics make a movie good? What is impressive on the part of the people involved? Give me $500 million and I could blow your mind at least as thoroughly.
I kinda liked this movie when I saw it, but I fail to see how being cute and making vague commentary has earned it all this praise. Pocahontas, from like 15 years ago, was better and I'm not just going on nostalgia. I'll give Saldana credit but the main guy couldn't even keep his accent in line.
I think this was a lot more of a spectacle than Transformers. Even though it wasn't anything all too original, the culture and the world creation that went into this movie was worth the price of admission alone. Which is a good thing, because that was basically the only value this movie had.
Transformers has no redeeming qualities.
None.
No, not even shiny giant fighting robots.
You have no taste in movies.
Hypothetically, of course. I'm not actually talking to anybody.
@-wahn-:
I think what matters is if the movie are entertaining or enjoyable to the audience, not how complex, intricate, and original the story is. In Avatar's case, it gets its hype because of the visual effect, and most people enjoy that aspect so I don't really see any problem there. The story, eventhough its been done hundreds time before, is still a good story to me. I guess people just dislike the movie because of the hypes its getting so they complaints about the movie didn't deserve the hype claiming the story didn't brought anything new to the film industry.
I dunno about things like bringing new material into the movie industry, because well… I don't watch alot of movies. My complaints towards it was pretty stand alone. A plot could be redone a thousand times, but what matters to me is if the movie entertains me enough. As far as Avatar goes, I was only entertained by the final minutes but it still felt like some moments fell flat.
As long as the movie was, I thought there should have been a more cleaver take to build up the climax. As far as it goes, it was mostly about showing off visuals and the overuse of that made me really bored. The music didn't seem to help much either.
The music actually didn't impress me all that much. Just the typical epic music and when the scene called for it, the wailing lady. Nothing special.
Overall the movie was pretentious and forgettable. I had to ask my friend a minute ago how the movie even ended. The movie obviously thought we were stupid so it had to hammer us repeatedly with war is bad and save the environment. The visuals would have been more impressive if I was more invested in the story. The aliens did have a good design though, and their hair was a nice touch.
The only character I liked was the researcher lady that died because she had quirks, somewhat.
@robbybedfart:
The worst part is, the very end of the movie had the tagline that apparently, Earth was pretty much dead and this was their only hope.
This wasn't their only hope or anything like that, tho. The script doesn't even imply that.
The Na'vi tribe's home wasn't the only source of fantasy metal, it was just the richest source they knew. This corporation and their private military force were there because digging fantasy metal was very good business. And Earth had become a dumpster without any green left (I.E Earth's ecology had died/was dying). That's pretty much it.
Earth becoming a crappy place is a big stable of speculative fiction and space sci-fi, anyway. It was also like that in Cameron's Terminator (you know, that slasher movie rip-off with a sci-fi twist and with cutting edge special effects 
). Hey, Avatar could perhaps even be happening in the same universe as Terminator.
This wasn't their only hope or anything like that, tho. The script doesn't even imply that.
And thats entirely my point. The humans were entirely unsympathetic. They had no motivation except for greed, so the scenario was entirely 100% black and white. The nature side was good, the sci-fi side was bad. (except the scientists. They were good. But they'd been hanging out with that nature side, so they knew better.)
(And it does have that offhand mention in the last 3 seconds that they're returning to their "dying world". But obviously there was no explanation or follow up on that. Same way there was no explanation for what unobtanium even does. Cure plauge? Grow plants? Rocket fuel? Infinite energy? Anti-gravity? Amazing porn stimulant?)
Which means, the villains were as full well rounded and interesting as Captain Planet villains, polluting and destroying sheerly because it seemed like it would be fun and a quicker way to get what they wanted.
Oh, and because "those stupid savages just didn't know better. It's JUST trees!"
Its a cheap, heavyhanded tactic to keep us from questioning the "hero" and the fact that, really, everything he did was incredibly wrong and selfish as well.
A couple sentances changed, where it actually became IMPORTANT for the humans to win, instead of being generic baddies, would have made so much difference. It would have changed the entire tone and feel of the last half hour and put a new spin on the first hour once you reached that point. But "Evil general who likes war because he likes war!" is pretty bland. And obviously it was so you could easily root for the one side and not feel guilty at the end.
Only needed a couple extra words or details to flesh out and add so much depth.
What's so bad about Pocahontas, thought it was every bit as entertaining as Hercules and the great mouse detective. Sure it wasnt Aladdin great but still not a bad movie by any means.
It was just… average compared to most of the other Disney flicks released during that time. The Lion King really gave me a sense of being in the heart of Africa, Aladdin made me believe we deep in the Arab desert but Pocahontas just bored me. This has nothing to do with the soundtrack (which was excellent if I remember) or the animation, it just didn't feel as inventive or as magical as some of Disney's other work.
Another complaint would be that Pocahontas spent a large part of the movie faffing about with animals instead of actually advancing the plot. Pointless filler aside, it felt like a uncomfortable step back to 1940's Disney and their dated "singing with the animals" dreariness and the blandness that goes with it. Which brings me onto the enxt thing, everyone in the movie is hideously bland. Pocahontas can be summed up with "lol nature", John Smith with "OMG HOTNESS I WANT 2 BANG U", and the villain is pretty much the embodiment of generic evilness, he even has a stupid white cat.
So yeah, not a bad movie for kids but a poor Disney film when compared to others. Only my opinion though.
Doesnt decent hold just about the same meaning as average? Or have i got it all wrong:ninja:
You win this round…
@The:
People who are saying that this is the best movie they've ever seen/of the decade/of the year don't know what they're talking about/haven't seen many movies.
I couldn't agree more. When thrown in the ring with movies like The Hurt Locker, Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans, Up in the Air, & District 9 Avatar just doesn't stand up.
As for best movie of the decade, you just have to question what rock people have been living under. The past decade gave us some all time great films like Man on Wire, Borat, Spirited Away, The Dark Night, & Oldboy.
And again, Cameron was working on this for ten whole years and this is the best he can come up with? From him I expected better, something original. Not to say the acting left something to be desired. And watching Michelle Rodriguez is always an unbearable task…
With all that said I have high hopes for the sequels, and would perfer something original this time Mr. Cameron.
Apparently you folks need a refresher on Pocahontas, and what was wrong with it. Woo hoo magic language barrier crossing! Yaye for incredibly doofy sidekicks! A gold mining operation that involves digging!
"They're not like you and me, so that means they must be evil!"
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Yeah yeah, I know. It's Nostalgia Chick and she's not as good as Critic but… she's the one that reviewed it.
Correction she's even better than the critic.
But she isn't nearly as goofy with over the top reactions and facial expressions!
Yeah but Doug doesnt have nearly enough going on in the clevage department.
That and yknow those other less sexist reasons i wont go into at this point:ninja:
I just saw this movie and I have to say I hated it. I tend to hate movies when they get over the top amounts of praise which they do not deserve. I thought it was cheesy and poorly acted. It is not the best movie of all time like many claim or the best movie of 09. I thought, as many have said before, if was just Pocahontas with aliens. They didn't even try to make them different;Navive(whatever the aliens were called)-Navahoe,Jake Sully-John Smith. It looks like James Cammeron took a mysticism class and combined it with aliens and Pocahontas. It is a mediocre movie and I even saw it in Imax 3d.
Best Movie of 09
District 9 (I didn't see Up in the air or Hurt Locker)
Best Movies of the decade
City of God, Pans Labryith,Lord Of the Rings Saga and Dark Knight minus Cristian Bale's stupid Batman Voice
I guess I'm one of the few who enjoyed the acting. I really liked it. They made it very clear from the start that Jake is a, "Let's git me sum badguys!", simple man and that came across in his acting. I totally believed it.
In fact, outside of parts of The Abyss (which I think is entirely due to the most amazing character actor of our age Ed Harris) and Terminator 2 (which is god-cum splattered on celluloid) it was the first time I believed every character in a James Cameron film.
That's not to say they don't make odd choices, but with what they were giving they did a remarkable job…FOR the film they were working on.
The acting wasn't bad, but the script didn't help with the "who's bad"s and "hoo-RAH"s. And Mr. Colonel Marine bad guy (?) guy and his robot personality. Come on. Even the big CEO head honcho guy conveyed a little remorse. I kind of hate that Cameron has to put one of those kind of "villains" in every one of his movies.
And what are the best movies of the year, anyway? Besides this movie of course
It's all a matter of opinion, but when you stack up story, character development, dialogue, direction, and visuals…
The Road, A Serious Man, Up, Fantastic Mr. Fox, Princess and the Frog, and Star Trek were all better movies than Avatar. And three of those are animated movies, without physical actors.
buttcheeks
@robbybedfart:
And thats entirely my point. The humans were entirely unsympathetic. They had no motivation except for greed, so the scenario was entirely 100% black and white.
True. Perhaps the movie could had been more morally ambiguous, I like gray, but I felt the people of the corporation were already surprisingly abide, humane and resourceful for bad guys of the story anyway. Go Hollywood!
There were p-l-e-n-t-y of room to make these bad guys appear more evil, make the movie more black and white, if Cameron had just wanted so. It could had been done easily. It wasn't like in Rambo 4 where you have bad guys having sex with children because they are so bad or like 300 which had bad guys who were degenerates from house of horror (and the good guys were stoic beautiful aryans -_-). Instead, for example, these bad guys used riot gas and means of negotiation even though could had just used their big guns from the very beginning.
But then again there's Dune. Which is one of my favourite novels ever and is very similar to Avatar. It has a planet with an unique ecosystem and resilient natives. The planet is the source of a resource which is very valuable. The hero is forced to live with the natives. He falls in love with a native and the planet, becomes one of the natives and leads a rebellion against occupying forces. And some other clear similarities.
And that story has a bad guy, Baron Harkonnen, who is very good at being evil. And I have never minded about bad guys of Dune being unsympathetic, in fact I don't think I have ever seen anybody complaining about not being able feel sympathy for Harkonnen, and I don't see why I should treat Avatar any differently.
There were p-l-e-n-t-y of room to make these bad guys appear more evil, make the movie more black and white, if Cameron had just wanted so.
More evil. More likeable. One way or the other, they needed to be more.
Cause really. We're supposed to root for the aliens over the humans. But… we're human. We're naturally going to be entrenched into the human side, no matter how much we're supposed to root against them. I don't care how awesome the alien planet is or beautiful to look at, its HUMANS versus ALIENS.
So either the humans needed to be slightly more sympathetic so we could feel the plight on both sides, (and thus add some ambiguity and wierd feelings to the mix and go
well, neither side is right, but its mostly that one ass general) or they needed to be nastier so we'd be okay with completely rooting against them. (which is easier to do in human vs. human conflicts. like in… any war movie ever. Especially anything with nazis.)
But. This movie cost 500 million dollars, so it was never going to try a RISKY formula or something that made you think. The sheer budget always meant it was going to be simple and familiar, straightforward and one sided. Which is a shame. But the fact that its grossed a billion dollars already says it did what it set out to do.
Well, maybe the now inevitable sequal will be better, since he probably won't retread that specific story again.
I'm really tempted to hunt down reviews for Disney's Dinosaur from 10 years ago that basically say "Amazing new cgi technology! Great visuals! Massive potential! Shame the story is the same ol' same ol'.
@The:
And Mr. Colonel Marine bad guy (?) guy and his robot personality.
Huh and here i was thinking that Stephen Langs performance was the high point of the movie.
He was stale. Sure, he gave us a reason to hate him, but he was so one-dimensional I could see his binary coding. A good villain needs layers. Sure he was a violent asshole, but there has to be more to a character than that. He had no motivation as a "villain" (a term I'm using loosely here because Avatar has no clear-cut villain) other than "I need to kill stuff (and I don't care what) because I'm a marine!!"
Hate him? I was rooting for him the whole time.
Not saying that he was any sort of great innovative character, just saying that he had this great zany over the top hardass and he seemed to have fun with the role. And i was througly entertainted everytime he was on the screen.
I'm basically just arguing against the case that Avatar is a "good movie." It's entertaining, sure.
I think it's probably because Langs zany character seemed so damn out of place in this whole solemn world where everything is serious buisness that i found him so damn fun.
Hm, best movies of the year? I haven't seen Inglorious Basterds yet (got the DVD for Christmas but haven't got around to watching it yet) so The Hurt Locker (didn't even realise it came out this year) and District 9.
And I hardly ever notice bad acting but I didn't really find any problems with the acting in this movie.
Kairouseki, thank you for bringing that up.
Avatar was in 'production' for something like a decade or more.
Inglourious Basterds was in 'production' for something like a decade or more.
Avatar was held back because of technology and money.
Inglourious Basterds was held back because, well, it took Tarantino a decade or more to write every last line of the thing.
Every single line in Inglourious Basterds is deftly crafted and placed to enhance the experience.
Without question, my two favorite scenes in the film both involve no more than five people just talking. I think both scenes go on for probably 15 minutes and its just characters literally sitting down chatting.
Those two scenes are tenfold more exciting than Avatar's best chase scene or thought-provoking than anything Avatar offers.
I was disappointed.
James Cameron isn't Michael Bay. At least he shouldn't be for a 10 year investment in the film. If he spent a fraction of his millions on a plot with more depth than Pocahontas with Wolves I'd have enjoyed it for more than the CG.
I wonder what people would say about this movie if Dances with Wolves or Pocahontas had never come out?
Seriously. Would it be incredibly original without those two movies to compare it to?
Its flaws go deeper than being similar to a couple movies that came out 15 or 20 years ago. If it had great characterization or dialouge no one would care.
Would it be considered original? …Perhaps, though the existence of those stories certainly weighs very heavily on this one because James Cameron explicitly said Avatar WASN'T going to be like them, and that turned out to be a bald-faced lie.
It is a very flawed film in how hamfisted it is and in how remarkably shallow --pretentious, even-- it is. I mean, even the name "unobtanium" sounds like something a teenaged Jame Cameron thought up as a 14 year old or whatever and refused to let go. Like many of the things about the film that make it difficult to judge in a vaccuum, the hype did it a disservice in this viewers eyes. Cameron touted Avatar to be the Big Bang of filmmaking and a cultural movement and all I saw was a very pretty Summer Action Film. The fact that he took a very literal 10 years to make this and the story and characters were this flimsy when they didn't have to be makes me think the movie is unworthy of all this praise.
Not to drag down his technical and visual achievements, which I've been following since the movie was announced -- the movie just doesn't stand on them alone. At least, it ought not to. What most people seem to think is that amazing graphics are worth a shitty story and still make the movie amazing.
I disagree.
And Greg makes an amazing point. Inglorious Basterds was easily one of the best movies I'd ever seen, let alone seen last year, and it went through 10 years of production too. The polish, depth, panache (and perhaps most importantly, Tarantino's sometimes absent self-control) showed. Here? Not so much.
"unobtanium" is a real scientific term that's been in use for decades for rare/hard to get/theoretical/might as well not exist minerals.
Give Cameron guff, but not for using a legit scientific term.
I give him said guff over the term because it's VERY lazy and it's a term that essentially describes bullshit. He may as well have called it "Plot Point".
ITS A FUCKING LEGITIMATE SCIENTIFIC TERM.
It may sound stupid, but scientists use it, it's been around for decades, and scientists aren't the most creative when it comes to naming things to begin with. We have "Krypton" and "Einsteinium" after all.
Call it out for the weak plot, characters, forgettable music or what have you, all the things it legitimatley fails at. But its unfair to complain about elements of the science that are actually researched and solid, just because you're unfamiliar with a term.
I'm not saying that it isn't, just that it isn't very creative at all, especially considering the fact that they invented a language (or at least part of it) for the movie. My problem with unobtanium is the same with the planet's name being Pandora. It's almost admitting creative failure.
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Speaking of the marine villain, I was not fond of his chracter either…. He seemed awfully dull but he does get some cool points after he started dusting fire off his shoulder. The battle with him was pretty cool.
The thing that made me chuckle to myself in the theater is the way the group out of captivity/prison.... It felt like a blooper almost. I mean, they way the main villain sudden reacted when he saw the escapees inside one of their high tech ships was funny. The building is so high tech yet the security missed them until the last minute? They didn't even seem that stealthy either. The place probably had one camera.
I'm odd, but that was the funniest scene to me.
I'm not saying that it isn't, just that it isn't very creative at all, especially considering the fact that they invented a language (or at least part of it) for the movie. My problem with unobtanium is the same with the planet's name being Pandora. It's almost admitting creative failure.
I dunno, I think that's in line with how HUMANS name celestial objects. I mean, the other planets in our solar system are Roman Gods.
Is it really so farfetched that someone named some other planet after some Greek mythological woman?
If they put it in there thinking, "hey, humans usually use Roman gods to name planets, so lets choose Pandora at random," would it be any more creative?
Its sound reasoning anda legitimate scientific choice.
Besides, Pandora's Box is is a myth about unleashing horrors thanks to someone being too curious. There's all sorts of smbolism in the name.
Avatar just made it to #2 on the top grossing movies of all time. Cammeron now holds the #1 spot with Titanic and #2 with Avatar. This makes me hate Avatar even more. I can see why people like the movie but it is not that good. Avatar has now surpassed the departed as the most overrated movie of all time in my opinion. The thing I hate most about this movie is that it has eclipsed District 9 a movie that, unlike Avatar, is independent and made on a limited budget, has interesting characters, well written and ORIGINAL. THe only thing that could make me hate Avatar more is if it had a sequel.
It's so cliché, though. "Let's call it Pandora, because once they arrive, anything can happen!" It's a name that's basically suggesting all too loudly that "interesting shit is going on here!" If they actually read into the story beyond that, they would find out that it doesn't work so well as that (being the explanation for women being brought to earth as a pestilence upon men).
Is it really that hard to make a name? Call the metal tu'rilea and the planet Creenone or something. I made those up in a split second and checked google to see if they existed. They may be crappy names, but at least it's better than naming your empty plot points for what they are.
