I bought into the hype. I’m a sellout. I say I don’t want shiny things, but secretly I love them. I want them. I need them. My inner geek screams at my creative side. Forget everything else. Just focus on what’s shiny. Go “oooh”. Go “aaah”. Do it. You know you want to.
I watched Avatar yesterday.
Yeah, everything was eye-popping gorgeous. It was one of the most photo-realistic CGI ever. The 3D was good and the illusion of things popping out of the screen was sublime. Pandora was 10 years in the making. Pandora was imagined even before the technology to make it existed. Every blade, every animal, everything in Pandora has a rich background. Every living thing in Pandora has a Na’vi name, a latin name and a common name. Every blade and leaf you see on-screen can be found in Pandorapedia. A linguist was hired to create the language of the Na’vi. It has syntax, it has grammar. And its vocabulary is growing. 10 years to create the ultimate sci-fi fantasy world.
But what about the story? My wife succinctly puts it, “For a movie that took a decade to make, the story could have been more polished”.
Yup, the weakest part of Avatar is its story. Me and the wife had so much fun nitpicking the little details over lunch.
- Why is Jake, supposedly given a sign by the Ehwa, utterly useless in the end? It wasn’t the brilliance of Jake uniting the clans who won the day, it was the Ehwa sending those huge dino-sized animals.
- A scientist saw that Jake was talking about the home tree of the Omaticaya tribe to the general and head of operations. Why wasn’t it reported to the professor? And why was no action or discussion was taken on the part of the scientists regarding Jake?
- After chopping off the great home tree of the Omaticaya tribe, why didn’t we see any mining operation done?
Was the bombing of the Tree Of Souls necessary? - If profit is the motive for bringing down the home tree in the first place, shouldn’t the head of the mining operation be irked at the expense of finding the insignificant escapees? It’s not like they’re much of a threat anyway.
- Why does Jake think that rushing the ground forces, who have superior range and weapons technology, is a good tactic?
- If Trudy is supposed to be this hot-shot pilot and very familiar with the floating mountains, why is she so bad at using cover against the slow-moving-but-much-larger air vehicle?
- Choosing a bird is one of the traditions for becoming one of the Omaticaya tribe. Everyone knows he already has a bird. Isn’t it suspicious that Jake suddenly has another one? A much larger one at that. Sure, only 5 people in the Omaticaya’s history flew those huge birds. But these people are those who were chosen by the bird itself. And 5 people flew means only 5 people survived the initial fight with the great bird that chose them.
- The Omaticaya people are supposed to wise. If they allowed Jake to stay and they know that he’s not one of them, why are they not wise enough to study and learn his ways as well?
- I did a double-take in the theatre and almost burst out in giggles in the final fight scene. A 5-metre tall mechanized exo-skeleton that has 1-1 response to body movement for control and awesome transparent 3D HUD display, still requires a rear view mirror! Does it have side-mirrors as well? Do the pilots need to check their blind spot before making a turn? Glad to know that in the future, safety is still a top priority.
- If it’s dangerous to cut off an avatar while it’s still running, why does it happen so many times in the course of the movie?
- This is our land? Really? You sure about that?
Yeah, the list gets more nitpicky towards the end. I can’t help it. Jake, to me, is an uncessary character. The story could be told from the viewpoint of a young Na’vi tribesman, making it into the big wigs and it would still make sense, maybe even instilling a deeper meaning into the overall story.
I read sometime somewhere that James Cameron wants to out-lucas George Lucas. Seems like he has already reached Lucas’ level. Cameron’s Terminator series (1 and 2) is akin to Lucas’ original Star Wars trilogy in its cult status and awesomeness. But I guess Avatar is akin to Star Wars: The Phantom Menace, impressive CGI, unimpressive narrative.
And on that note, I leave you now with this little gem:
Tags: avatar
To many of your questions may later have answers occurred.
The sign given by Eywa might not in any way have to be diminished by the choice to send nature into combat as well, because the sign was the assurance of Jake’s safety in first place.
It protected him from being killed, and then from being outcast before he could grow into the person that he became. The sign was thus preemptive to anything bad happening to Jake.
Then, at the Tree of Souls, Jake made a prayer, and anyone who is a believer into God will easier comprehend that a prayer can be answered. Nature’s untypical interference into clashes was a decision following upon a prayer.
Then there is the scientist mentioned who saw Jake reporting to the colonel.
We did not see the scientist reporting, but we saw the consequence from the report.
They moved up to that sector 26 – please forgive if I misstate the location – where they were out of reach of A) military physical influence (because we learn later that they don’t fly up there, as instruments and sight are hindered) and B) Jake feeling the urge to get easily over to them as he did prior to the outpost station.
There is so much more.
The story is maybe a bit weak, but it is like with Rubens. His on highest level expressed art was not to paint minutiously every stroke on canvas with sharply defined lines, but to accentuate what our eye and brains fill up with our inner self and the information we can project on it.
Rubens was one of the worlds most revered artist and also humanist.
He painted for the Medici and many royals across Europe.
But a closer look on his paintings will tell you, that his pictures have true sharpness when stepping back and looking at it.
Then we understand the saying: BEAUTY IS IN THE EYE OF THE BEHOLDER.
The detail is important, true, but not in this sphere of life. There are people who are trained to connect the dots when they “zoom out”. Microscopic view can be misleading at times – not always I admit.
Nevertheless we share positive feelings for this movie, which could have some social impact if it settles down.
All the best, ATM
@Ameen Th. Mann:
Well, it’s just a movie, and I believe the point of this movie is to showcase the technology behind it. The only impact it will make is that now, Hollywood believes that “3D is the wave of the future!!”. And every movie, whether it deserves it or not, will have the big question mark beside it: “Will it be in 3D?”
The story has more holes than Swiss cheese and there’s no point in delving deep into it. The underlying message has been done to death many, many times before. For a movie 10 years in the making, somehow, the narrative seemed to have been developed in the last 10 days. A few of my friends held the opinion that this is just a tech demo. Thus Mr James Cameron chose a “safe” story, one that can be easily accepted, so that the tech behind it shines through.
Avatar isn’t a bad movie, but neither is it a good one. It’s just one more among many. I watched it once, in 3D, and it was cool, but that’s about it. It’s not worth taking a second look.