Dances with Wolves Meets My Little Pony - But I Loved It!

Rating: Null/10 (16 January 2010)

If you are going to see Avatar, see it in 3D. I can't imagine it having anything like the impact in boring old 2D as it does in 3D. Possibly 2010 will be the year that 3D finally comes of age? I really loved this movie – it blew me away. The movie just leaps off the screen visually and grabs you by the jugular.
The story is quite obviously director James Cameron's unapologetic take on the white man's conquest of North America and the assault on the Indians (well it could be any act of colonialism really, the British in Australia, the Spanish in Central America.. basically the locals are in the way of the invaders' desire to grab the resources), except in this case, the Indians win. You can call the story simplistic, you can accuse it of plagiarism, but it is what it is and Cameron need make no apologies for it. It's a vehicle for the stunning CGI, nothing more nothing less, it's not subtle but neither is it pretentious or 'posy'. What you see is what you get. And what you get is spectacular.
The performances are all excellent; I loved Sam Worthington in the role of hero Jake Sully. I last saw Worthington in the Australian movie Getting Square, alongside one of my favourite actors David Wenham and I think he has a huge future ahead of him as an international star. Worthington's Sully is a paraplegic ex marine on the planet (OK it's a moon really) Pandora, taking the place of his dead twin brother to become an avatar, mind melded to the genetically modified body of an aboriginal inhabitant of the planet. Pandora is under major assault from the military industrial complex, who are after a local mineral, Unobtainium. The biggest deposit of Unobtainium is right under the local's main spiritual site, and the invaders want to move them. As Dr Grace Augustine, Sigourney Weaver is in her element. Grace is the leader of the avatar program, and determined to protect the locals from the rapacious advance of the miners under the command of Miles Quaritch (Stephen Lang) a slightly rabid, gung ho Colonel who has little time for the bleeding heart, liberal approach to planetary conquest.
Going undercover on Pandora amongst the locals – the Na'vi – Sully in his avatar embodiment inevitably falls in love and turns from the Dark Side to the side of the angels, becoming a hero who helps them fight off the invaders. His love interest is Neytiri (Zoe Saldana – previously fabulous as Uhura in Star Trek). Neytiri is a bow wielding strong Cameron woman in the tradition he has established of Girlies who can take care of themselves - and I love him for that alone.
That is the bare bones of the story. It is how it is told that makes Avatar worth seeing – possibly more than once. Cameron throws in elements from just about every big movie franchise of the last two decades. There are 'nods' to Star Trek, Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Dances with Wolves, The Magnificent Seven and even, dare I say, My Little Pony. But it is all quite upfront and obvious, nothing subtle here, so I don't have a real problem with it. Pandora is a low gravity planet and the science makes reasonable sense. My spouse – who counts himself as something of an aviation expert – tells me the helicopter rotors were believable for low G, and certainly low gravity plus a very thin atmosphere might lead to tall, lean people of the type seem in Avatar, I'm not sure the blue skin color is believable, but who knows? Certainly if evolution had followed a similar course to the earth, the absence of a cataclysmic meteor impact might leave a population of large reptiles, even flying reptiles, and a fairly insignificant mammal population. This is all stunningly presented to the viewer in glorious technicolor and 3D which literally leaps out of the screen and grabs you by the eyeballs, aerial jelly fish float above the seat in front of you, primordial creatures leap off the screen at you. I haven't seen anything this impressive since I last went to the Monterey Bay Aquarium, and I found myself wondering how long Cameron has spent standing in front of the Sea Nettle exhibit?
Avatar is an astonishing achievement, and I am quite prepared to forgive Cameron the simplistic characters and linear story, because he has had the guts to produce something this visually stunning. I'm really looking forward to the next 3D offering that the movie world has to offer.