My neck hurts, but: What a movie!

Rating: 8/10 (28 December 2009)

Going into the theater, I didn't put too much hope into this film. Even though I love pretty much all of Cameron's work (with the exception of, maybe, Piranha II), these days you can't take the quality of a movie for granted just because a big director is at the helm. Just look at the Star Wars prequels or Indy 4.
I saw Avatar on one of the biggest screens in my hometown on X-Mas-day, it was pretty much sold out and I could only get a very bad seat: first seat in row four..ouch! But you know what? Once the film started, I hardly noticed the uncomfortable viewing-position. This alone and the fact that I also hardly noticed the 160-min running time speak volumes for the quality of the film. It's been a long time since I've seen such a strange, beautiful, "realistic" and fantastic world brought to life so perfectly on the screen. It really puts Lucas and his Star Wars prequels to shame.
And yet: Even though I know that 60% of the action is CGI, I never lost my suspension of disbelief. The creatures look so life-like, the blend between real actors and computer-graphics is so seamless that it never distracts you. Granted: The story is pretty much a rehash of Last Samurai/Dances with Wolves, even down to details such as the love-story or certain characters' fates. But so what? The love-story itself should be old news ever since Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet, but good variations of the theme still can cut it in our modern age. So does Avatar: Cameron shows once again why effect-fests like Transformers simply don't work: If you don't have a good story and likable, fleshed-out characters you can throw in all that CG-crap you want: The film's not gonna draw you in. Effects should always be used as a means to tell your story, to enhance your vision. And even though Avatar is full of some of the most amazing CGI I've ever seen, Cameron uses it just as that: as a film-making tool, albeit, a very powerful one.
Before this gets too long, let me close by highly recommending that you watch Avatar in 3D. The process works amazingly well, is used pretty subtly here and there wasn't a single shot that felt like they were just showing off the 3D-capabilities. If you've seen "Jaws 3D", you know what kind of shots I'm talking about.