"Avatar" review

Visually stunning? Yes. Epic? Yes. At least, wide in its scope. Original? Hardly.

James Cameron's visionary dream is creative and imaginative in its presentation, but it falls short in its story-telling. The world of Pandora is beautiful, full of wild creatures and exotic plants. It is inhabited by the Na'vi people, a race completely unified with Eywa, their deity, the energy that binds and surrounds them. They are threatened by the "Skypeople," humans who abandoned their "dying world" to extract a valuable substance ironically called unobtanium from Pandora's soil, in spite of the fact that the Omaticaya clan of Na'vis live on the richest deposit. To me, it was the cliched tale of greedy people taking what they want from anyone, damned be the consequences. Don't get me wrong - I love nature and am all for going green. I can recognize that we need to appreciate the abundance around us and care for our planet, as well as respect the cultural ways of other people who we may not understand, or with whom we may not agree. Yet the plot behind "Avatar" reminded me of "Fern Gully." Remember "Fern Gully"? Fairies living happily in the rainforest until evil man with his big ugly machines comes to tear it all down? Throw in a little Trail of Tears/indigenous relocation, a bicultural star-crossed romance, and a Matrix-like connection to another world, and you have hit the nail right on the head.

I'm not saying I did not enjoy the movie. Quite the contrary. This was the first non-documentary movie I've seen completely in 3-D (as opposed to IMAX nature films seen at the MN Zoo, and brief scenes in recent "Harry Potter" movies), and I really wish we had been able to see it 3-D in IMAX. Alas, "The Wolfman" chased "Avatar" out of the giant-screen theater in St. Michael, so we settled for 3-D on a regular movie screen. Which is fine. I was still able to appreciate the animation. It's extremely impressive that such a complete world (although did anyone else notice the Na'vi never ate anything?) could simply be pulled from the imagination in such detail and clarity, making dreams that much more tangible. Cameron pulled out all the stops, somehow creating a world by combining the beauty and mystery of both the rainforest and the depths of the oceans. From the heights of the floating mountains, through the vast and open skies, to the forest floors, Pandora is amazing. It did remind me a little of Dinotopia mixed with Naboo, but for a tiny moon, it's full of incredible flora and fauna.

Aside from aesthetics, the tiny cultural details were also quite thorough. Not only did the Na'vi have their own language, they had separate and distinctive clans as well. The creatures with whom the Na'vi interact are reminiscent of animals seen on Earth (at one time or another), but unique in their own ways. Something I particularly liked was the direct link between the Na'vi and the creatures. It solidified the concept of a planet (or moon) with an all-encompassing energy firing like neurons in the brain, connecting everything to everything else.

In addition to the creative details, the actor portrayal was impressive. The use of performance capture ensured that the actors' facial expressions were completely transferred to their computer-generated counterparts. Before seeing the film, I was slightly put off by the appearance of the tall, blue people, but while watching it, it is easy to see how the Na'vi actually look like the actors (especially Sigourney Weaver's...whose avatar TOO closely resembled the actress). Their movements were extremely natural, and it became easy to forget I was watching something designed on computers.

I thought Sam Worthington turned in a very good performance, although I have nothing to which I can compare; I had never seen him in any other movies prior to this. I thought his portrayal of paraplegic ex-Marine Jake Sully, the film's hero, was believable, and his emotional transition from former soldier to invested anthropologist and tribal hero was well done. Not only did his hair become longer and disheveled, but the video diaries of his experiences began awkwardly and became increasingly heartfelt. I also thought it was impressive making his legs appear shriveled and useless (unless they were real...in which case, he must have had one hell of a workout routine for his role as Perseus in "Clash of the Titans"), and his disuse of them seemed natural.

Sigourney Weaver also did a wonderful job in her portrayal of the driven, tough-on-the-outside scientist in charge of the avatar project. I really grew to like her, and she seemed to soften towards Jake as he got deeper into Na'vi culture than she ever had.

Stephen Lang was villainous as Colonel Quaritch, your typical militant let's-blow-things-up bad guy. He had a wicked awesome scar on his head from his first experience on Pandora, and he was extremely determined to do whatever it took to get the Omaticaya away from the unobtanium deposit. He was wonderfully disconnected from the consequences, nonchalantly sipping coffee while watching the Omaticaya's home get destroyed on his orders.

Zoe Saldana, of whom I am not the biggest fan, did a decent job lending her voice and facial expressions to Neytiri, the female Na'vi protagonist, who happens to be the Omaticayan princess and Jake's love interest and cultural teacher. They had fairly good chemistry "on screen," but I felt her role in general was cliched.

Overall, I really enjoyed this movie, and it nearly exceeded my minimal expectations. I knew the story would be so-so and the animation superb, but the combined effect was surprisingly pleasing. It's generally predictable (and for me, that's saying something...I'm usually terrible with plot predictions), but very entertaining. I'm glad I saw it. (I could go into the ethical issue of creating a hybrid creature of human and Na'vi DNA to simply use as a shell to house someone else's mind...but I just don't have the energy.)