Mr so-called "King of the World" returns with a visually dazzling spectacle and so-so story

Rating: 6/10 (19 December 2009)

James Cameron has big ideas and big visions. Thankfully, the latter he dives into with a lust for cinematic glory and (with more money than some countries have in an entire year) he has made his vision of a planet called Pandora in the year 21-something something of a real wonder. If only his big ideas weren't, for the most part, cribbed from other movies and stories and archetypes. I would be reminded of Joseph Campbell's myth-buster formula that so many have taken to heart in adventure movies, but Cameron's formula would appear to come second to his attention to visual detail. This has its pros and cons, some more or some less depending on what viewer sees/hears in it all.
It is ambitious, and quite expensive, and it all shows up on the screen. It has to be said, Avatar is absorbing to look at. So much time and energy was spent into creating this fictional alien species, the Na'vi, and it pays off in the respect that Cameron's visual fx team painstakingly makes it appear real and otherworldly at the same time. We might recognize the lush and green surroundings, or even some of the trippy creatures, and if it comes close to anything it's like Ferngully: The Last Rainforest squared and made semi-pre-historic. But it's the scope and grandeur, and when we see the Na'Vi in close-ups or even just far away, you can see the sweat and the detail in their faces, the human beings playing them projecting off the screen. I forgot, if only for a few moments at a time, that they were animated and done in motion-capture. If part of a filmmaker's job, in a situation like a super-mega-sci-fi epic is to make us believe in another world and place (even if it's familiar), then Cameron has done his job very admirably.
So if Pandora is great to look at (especially in the practically prerequisite 3D, which also has its own levels of detail and nuance and doesn't just JUMP at a viewer), and if the technology shown on screen- of how a human being goes into an avatar, is fascinating, then why isn't it such a smash all around? Simple - the story, and the characters. Cameron does pay them attention, but only inasmuch as to get us going into the Pandora environment. When he has characters like Jake Sully (very good Sam Worthington) and Neytiri (Zoe Saldana, even better) saying such trite dialog and going through the motions of a story that is familiar to anyone who has seen Ferngully or Dances with Wolves or, to a lessor extent, Last Samurai or New World (super pro-environment, obvious anti-colonialist), it starts to drag the film with it. I never grew tired of the cinematography or the wonderful sights on Pandora, but could I have done without such one-dimensional gritting-of-teeth from Stephen Lang? Absolutely.
I'm not sure if there should be more movies like Avatar. It takes a filmmaker with the ambition and drive, and the super-screw-you-guys clout that James Cameron has with such a project (not to mention the time for it allotted him - not since Kubrick has a filmmaker taken so long between projects), to pull off something like this. CGI-driven movies could progress thanks to the prowess displayed here, but it does need to be done with the right frame of attitude towards the story. Even if such story is formulaic as this one, a filmmaker does need to try and push the technology a little further while also not forgetting about the human element. Cameron comes close... no, he does go over the brink of doing style over substance, but for this case- and maybe just this one time from an otherwise masterful blockbuster director- it's satisfying.