Avatar

I was going to do a longer review of Avatar, explaining my thoughts and feelings regarding it, but then I stumbled upon this online youtube review and it sums up my feelings even better than I ever could. Be fore warned, this review is in 2 parts, and totals about 20 minutes. It is NSFW, but is really funny, really well put together, and hits all the points I was going to make. Thanks guy for allowing me not to have to write to much.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJarz7BYnHA&feature=channel

To sum up, Avatar was an OK movie. Yes, the new 3D and motion capture technology is great, and their CGI was pretty awesome. But so what. If you have to spend that much money to make your movie look that good, is it worth it? Do you have to rely on computers to create visually interesting set pieces? No. James Cameron set out to prove that he could revolutionize movies, and he supposedly did it. But in the long run, it's just going to make movies more expensive to make, which means studios will charge the theaters more to show them, which will in turn raise ticket prices to go to the movies even higher than their already astronomical rates. And when/if they don't recoup all their expenses during a theatrical run, the movie studios will in turn jack up DVD prices so they can try and squeeze every last dime out of the public. Is this what we want. To spend even MORE money on the movies just so we can see some blue people run around in space fern gully?

I love big, spectacular special effects and summer block busters. And I would have probably enjoyed Avatar even more if I could shrug off the bigger ramifications of a movie like this. But I couldn't. I also couldn't ignore that all the characters were so very basic that I didn't care what happened. Every plot point was so telegraphed that it carried no weight when it happened. And for a movie that was hoping, and ultimately succeeding in garnering Oscar buzz, this is a bad way to go about it. I read recently that Cameron and the producers were disappointed that none of their actors recieved Oscar nominations. Instead they will have to feast up on all the technical awards, as well as long shots for Director and Best Picture. Boo Hoo!

Anyone with any rational thought in their minds regarding movies and the award process would not even consider nominating any of these actors for an award for Best anything. This is not to mean to say that the film was poorly acted. The people did a fine job with what they were given. But what they were given just wasn't award worthy characters.

To finally sum up in what has turned out to be a much longer piece than I originally intended. Yes, Avatar looked cool. Too cool at times, as I got disoriented and annoyed with all the 3D shit they would pile up all at once. Yes, it was technologically ground breaking. No, it wasn't necessarily, and I don't want to see the larger ramifications of this kind of film becoming the standard.