Big Blue Empty

Rating: 1/10 (30 January 2010)

The first twenty minutes, although we're quickly force-fed the plot of a crippled marine going to a planet called Pandora where his counterpart "Avatar", clone to the indigenous natives, will seek trust in these tall blue Na'vi (all this happening while he, in human form, lays a tanning booth and guides the creature) in order to abduct a mineral to take back to earth (symbolizing oil, of course)... isn't bad, seeming as if a young James Cameron, who directed "Aliens", "The Terminator" and "The Terminator 2" with flowing precision, is at the helm. We're on a terrific adventure and it looks pretty neat.
But then something happens.
Once within the forest, separated from his fellow troops, the Avatar discovers he digs the peace-loving natives more the banal humans, falls in love with the hottest of the tall blue elf-folk, and after taming a flying dragon and bedding down the babe, he's "one of the gang" way too quickly.
Most of the action of the film's first half, pitting our hero against forest-dwelling predators, is (in a visual and directorial sense) straight out of JURASSIC PARK; the thrills eventually taking a backseat to drawn-out new-age ceremonies and cheesy dialog too horrible to repeat.
And when the big battle ensues: The Honest Natives Vs. The Greedy Americans (of course there are a few good Americans, not including the director) - the hollowly undeveloped characters get lost within the expensive flash.
AVATAR, filmed in 3D but with 1D everything else, in trying to blend science-fiction, fantasy, romance, and a big bright moral message, ends up mirroring Cameron's view of the American Military: overwrought, overpriced and completely brain-dead.