Avatar! Bravo!

Rating: 8/10 (6 February 2010)

Dazzling scenes flash through——picturesque landscape, unearthly creatures, formidable machines and violent battles. The mastermind, James Cameron, after his unforgettable Titanic, once again fires his incredible imagination and feasts a lavish visual banquet for the audience which every one relishes with an amazing sense.
The film is visually enjoyable. Armored by the most advanced CG technology, "the king of the world" this time goes all out to realize what he has conceived for more than a decade and conjures a fantastic world to us. HE REALLY MADE IT! The landscape on Pandora dashing into eyes is exceedingly grandeur; the CG-made alien creatures and people so beautifully vivid; and the night view so mystically attractive. All those unbelievable pictures made us awed and eager for a trip there. I believe what crazes the audience more is its novel 3D visual effect which pioneers a new watching experience. The 3D visual effect perfects the splendid scenes and renders the audience a magnificent visual shock. Thousands of audience swarm into the cinema, desirous of tasting the visual revolution they have been waiting for years. And finally——WE ARE SATISFIED!
Beyond doubt, the monumental epic is anther epoch-making leap that is bound to earthquake the entire film industry and reopen a new era in special effect after 1977's Star Wars.
Although the eye-shocking scenes fascinate us, the implication beneath the plot is impressively thoughtful. As Russell D. Moore in The Christian Post precisely points it out "the medium was George Lucas, the message Che Guevara", the film is more than a simple visual satisfaction; it features a strong cultural clashes and struggle against imperialism, which exactly hits the point of the very dark side of mankind.
Time flies by, science develops, space explore furthers, human mind remains the same——Our greed seems to meet no bound; the mental ugliness is hard to dispel; the selfishness inside stays unchangeable for good; those fortune-makers exploit wealth by hook or crook, along with the war maniacs, uncaring the destruction and death. When the towering tree finally crumbled, the blatant outrage of human mounted to its top. Such fanatic imperialism mentality is unmasked to the audience, staggeringly and profoundly. James Cameron himself has acknowledged that Avatar implicitly criticizes America's War in Iraq and the impersonal nature of mechanized warfare in general. And though there are good humans in the film, the humans still represent the very bad parts of ourselves ——that may trash our world and push ourselves to a grim future.
As to the Navi people, a wonderful idea is delivered from the incredible director himself "the Navi represent something that is our higher selves, or our aspirational selves, what we would like to think we are" True! Throughout the film shines out a impeccable harmony on Pandora, so divine, nearly a paradise unachievable to human. And the people there are so devoted to family, so dedicated to each other, so fervent to the land they live in. Intoxicated with the beauty of the landscape, the purity of Navi, Jack, unlike other disturbing mind, put aside his human arrogance, melts himself into the tribe and become a part of them. This self-journey for Jack is a process of purification through which he finds out how ruthless human can be and the extreme bloodiness unleashed from the fanatic hearts. Disappointing in human, Jack fights hard and bravely for those who were supposed to be his enemies, with a bitter sadness.
The theme is a bit complicated and can be considered multi-faceted. It is primarily an action-adventure journey of self-discovery, in the context of imperialism and biodiversity. Some said that Avatar shares themes with the films At Play in the Fields of the Lord and The Emerald Forest, more critics tend to deem it a sci-fi version of Dances with Wolves, where a battered soldier, just like Jack in Avatar, finds himself drawn to the culture he was initially fighting against. The final words from the great talent can drive everybody home. "I have an absolute reverence for men who have a sense of duty, courage," he said implicitly, "but I'm also a child of the 60s. There's a part of me who wants to put a daisy in the end of the gun barrel. I believe in peace through superior firepower, but on the other hand I abhor the abuse of power and creeping imperialism disguised as patriotism. Some of these things you can't raise without being called unpatriotic, but I think it's very patriotic to question a system that needs to be corralled, or it becomes Rome"
A heavenly fantasy together with a poignant theme forges a sweeping epic of our time! A great breakthrough that stirs the world！ A marvelous work from a prodigious imaginer!
Wow! Avatar! Bravo!