Technically a success, but the villains suck

Rating: 8/10 (11 February 2010)

To say that Avatar is incredible is an understatement. Writer/director James Cameron's first directorial feature film since his Oscar-winning directorial effort in 1997's Titanic proved that he can still churn out critically-acclaimed box office hits.
With an estimated budget of US$280M, Avatar is one of the most expensive movies ever produced, and is the first film ever to earn over US$2B worldwide, making it the highest grossing film ever.
Relative unknown Sam Worthington (Terminator Salvation) is cast as Jake Sully, a paraplegic marine sent to the moon Pandora on a mission to infiltrate the enemy by assuming an alien body with the help of scientist Dr. Grace Augustine (Sigourney Weaver, who is reunited with her Aliens director). An accident facilitates Jake's acceptance into the alien community, but carrying out his mission becomes complicated when he falls for the alien Neytiri, played by Zoe Saldana (Star Trek), and the world he now sees with new eyes and he has to ultimately choose which reality he wants to save.
Since technically everything else is excellent, I have to gripe about the villains. Giovanni Ribisi (Public Enemies, Lost in Translation) plays Parker Selfridge, a sadly one-dimensional character bent on profits, while Stephen Lang plays Colonel Miles Quaritch, the stereotypical military man who impatiently muscles his way into anything. Both have no depth, no saving grace and become convenient objects of hate. Even Michelle Rodriguez typecasts herself once more by playing yet another tough girl role, macho helicopter pilot Trudy Chacon.
But that aside, the digs on the Bush administration's shock-and-awe tactics and the parallelism on the very current environmental degradation makes this cinematic experience easily digestible even when it takes its sweet time to entertain you, especially in 3D.