Incredible, inventive effects can't save this

Rating: 5/10 (29 December 2009)

James Cameron's long-awaited Titanic follow-up is very pretty to look at but suffers from a flimsy plot and astoundingly stupid plot development. The characters are one dimensional, both as written and as portrayed, and there's hardly anything unpredictable. The only thing this movie has going for it are its state-of-the-art effects, which are truly boggling.
Sam Worthington plays Jake, a paraplegic ex-Marine who's sent to a distant moon to help humans mine a mineral called unobtainium (in the running for the least creative chemical name ever). Seems there's a huge cache of the stuff under a huge tree in a jungle that's populated by an indigenous race called the Na'vi, blue-skinned, really tall people with feline characteristics. Meanwhile, a scientific program headed by Grace Augustine (played by a typically stiff Sigourney Weaver) has focused on learning as much as possible about the Na'vi in order to benefit scientific knowledge. Augustine's research (funded by the same company who's mining the unobtainium) involves the use of avatars, in which scientists form a psychological link with a mock-up that looks just like a native Na'Vi, the better for the humans to exist within the unbreathable atmosphere. Jake gets inside the Na'vi within his avatar and attempts to find out what they would want in exchange for moving from away from the giant store of unobtainium; during the course of his mission, he falls for the Na'vi chief's daughter, Neytiri (Zoe Saldana). (Of course he does.) And as said mission drags on, Jake's perspective changes from meathead jerk to tree-loving jerk, and he begins to wonder if what he's doing is right.
Is he serious? You're an alien race (humans) and have no business on this moon. Your employer's stated goal is to gobble up all the jewels he can find, basically raping the planet. Your employer will stop at nothing to get it, as he answers to no one. You're being sent down to find a diplomatic way to screw the natives out of the bounty on which they sit. And he thinks this might be wrong? A power grab ensues when the military leader of the human expedition, a Colonel Quaritch (Stephen Lang) decides enough is enough and wants to bomb the hell out of the Na'vi, with the approval of the head of the company, Parker Selfridge (Giovanni Ribisi), another patently obvious name. This sets up the rather obvious showdown between the primitive Na'vi and the gung-ho ex-Marine humans, who have missiles and guns and ammo and rockets and helicopters and who knows, even a Star Destroyer or two. The final battle scene is overtly reminiscent of the Battle of Endor in Return of the Jedi, in which the primitive Ewoks manage to defeat a stormtrooper army using only their quick wits and some old-school, homemade traps of destruction.
But even if the plot doesn't need to be complex, it sure ought to make sense. Here's a nonspoiler question to ponder. Jake, under the guise of his avatar, is taken in by the Na'vi, whose spiritual leader asks Neytiri to teach Jake their ways. Why this is to be is not terribly clear. It's evident that the humans have made several attempts at learning the ways of the Na'vi but that prior emissaries had been scientists; as soon as Jake tells the Na'vi that he's a warrior, they're all about teaching him. I don't quite follow the logic here; if I were the Na'vi and had not been able to teach the smart humans who obviously (to me) were not there to do me harm, why in the world would I want to teach someone who's used to using aggression and violence to solve problems? I get that the Na'vi, as a warrior race, would relate more to the soldier, but surely they would be reluctant to share knowledge with someone who was outside of their group anyway, let alone with one who might well do them harm.
Moreover, I'm not sure what the Na'vi thought Jake was, really. He looked like them, through his avatar, but they referred to him at least once as an alien. My best guess is that they just thought he was from another clan. Other clan? I'll assume that only this one clan, the Omaticaya, made its home at Hometree (yet another clumsy naming convention) and therefore was the only clan with a stake in protecting it. But if they simply thought Jake was from another clan, why did they let him in anyway? Why did they teach him? What purpose would it serve them? And on top of that, since the Omaticaya mentioned being approached by "aliens" before, doesn't it seem more likely that they would have assumed Jake was another alien ambassador anyway? This makes my brain hurt.
I think it's pretty obvious that Cameron wanted this to be his own Star Wars, an epic taking place on a distant world. He uses the standard Cameron recipe of astounding special effects and innovation coupled with a weak plot and laughable characters and hopes it all comes out okay (although for a movie that gestated for more than a decade, that's simplifying things a bit). The effects, it should be noted, are really mesmerizing visuals of the jaw-dropping variety. The 3D effects were unbelievable, and I mean that in a good way. Avatar is extraordinarily shot, using 60% CGI and 40% live action, and the two elements are flawlessly intertwined. It's a remarkable film.
But it's only part of a film. the entire movie seems to try pretty hard to keep some emotional distance from its audience, and when a film is emotionally uninvolving, it's lost the battle for your heart.
And that's the core problem. Despite some wonderful, beautiful effects, Avatar gives us characters in whom we can't really get invested, and when a key element of your story is an interspecies romance, this is a crucial, fatal flaw.