Avatar Special Edition: An attempt at making even more money!
Posted: Monday, August 30, 2010
by Brombergs 2 Cents
There are really only two groups of people that will not see Avatar: Those that never see movies or those that really do not care about visual spectacle. People that generally go to the movies would have to try hard not to go to this one since, like Titanic, it is big, bold, and everywhere. While I strongly feel that the story in this movie is nothing special (we've seen very similar plots played out in such movies as Dances with Wolves and Ferngully), the technological aspect is one of those things that sets the bar for all other visually inclined movies of the year (or maybe the next few years).
With that said, if you are one of the gazillions of people who saw it already at the theater, then don't bother going to see it again, the special edition contains only 10 or so new minutes of footage which shouldn't really do much for anyone less than die-hard fans.
One group of people that I bet hates this movie: IMAX Projectionists. Think about it, the movie is 2 hours and forty something minutes. This must be a pain in the cinematic ass to splice and maintain for X amount of weeks. I bet when they heard Avatar was coming back to IMAX they thought, "Ah crap! This means overtime and more days of watching gigantic blue cat people for hours." At least in Inception, another long IMAX movie, they could watch it again and again trying to make sense of the story. With Avatar you don't even have to watch it once to get the story and wow, I know, that is sad but true!
It is comforting to know that there still are people like director James Cameron that care so much about the little details in a film to spend roughly ten years of his life working on research and development. Special effects companies received specific instructions from him on how scenes should look and, in a sense, Cameron made their job easy by giving them solid direction in one of the more technologically advanced productions of its time.
I recommend this movie for the sheer fact that you are transported into another world. Like seeing a new Star Wars movie for the first time, the artwork alone is impressive and beautiful. There is so much animation in the movie that is blended seamlessly with live-action to achieve the effect that you are not watching a cartoon, but some hybrid of the real world and CGI. For me, the music plays a major part in how I enjoy any movie and composer James Horner (Titanic) does a great job enhancing the surreal world with a big, majestic score that works well in a film of this grandeur. Music can often make a film larger than it really is and in this case, Horner's grand, orchestral style plays well with this meticulously structured special effect laden extravaganza.
Moviegoers who appreciate eye candy and technical merit will find much to love about this film. Like Titanic, the film has a long running time, but unfortunately, like Star Wars, Avatar will never be known or even recognized for its acting or dialogue. Yes, some people will roll their eyes at the trite script that seems to beckon almost every genre movie they have ever seen. The good news is simply that most would give Cameron a pass and revel in his strengths, what some would call genius at providing a vision that very few directors can achieve, certainly in a hugely hyped mainstream film such as Avatar.
If you are even slightly interested in seeing Avatar, go see it while it is back in theaters. This is not a "see the DVD" movie unless you have a huge home theater HD setup with all the Blu-Ray bells and whistles. Know that Avatar is the Star Wars of today... a movie that even George Lucas could watch and say, "Cool!" Much of the effects are done by the company that produced Lord of the Rings, which was a film that used technology that gave Cameron hope that his vision could now be a reality. Four stars for high usage of state of the art technology and frequent images of eye candy.
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Top-level comments on this article: (3 total)I haven't seen it, but you make a good argument for doing so. What I don't understand is, if they had so much money to spend, and had such brilliant special effects etc. why didn't they bother with a clever script?Hey Jennifer! This movie is about the visual experience. My view is that story doesn't really matter in a movie like this. Just like acting doesn't really matter in Star Wars. Ya know?
I agree with you... you would think a little investment in a substantial script wouldn't be a bad idea. Well, no movie is perfect, and while many critics like to focus on how this movie is terrible because of the unoriginal story, I like to focus on the positives, at least when the positives outweigh the negatives. I go into a movie like this and say, "Now for some art." It is like looking at a painting.. only it is hundreds of paintings over 2.5 hours. Make sense? Thanks for reading... and do check it out, if anything, for the visuals. I just recently saw a great movie that I am writing about today... hope to get it up soon. :-) -Bromberg
Hi Mike. Welcome to SearchWarp. I was one of the moviegoers that thought it was a "Cool" movie, maybe it is because I don't know anything about how script and cinematic technology meshed together. Thank you for writing this well-written article.
All the best.~~NenitaThanks Nenita! I agree, this is a cool movie. I saw it on IMAX, I figured it was the type of movie you really should see on that format. The story is really the main thing that people use as the argument against it. Nobody ever says, "ehh, the effects weren't all that good." Nobody! Because the effects WERE that good. It is hard to blend live-action and animation where it doesn't look fake or like CGI... Avatar blends it seamlessly. Glad you liked the article and thanks for the great rating! -Bromberg
Good post...but I haven't seen AVATARThanks! If you feel like some cool visuals... check it out. And also if you have a few hours to kill ;-)Thats the difficult part in today's life...'killing few hours'. After office, think of Searchwarp, triond etc., then wife calling to help her out...ohh...Yeh! May try on weekends...Let's see...
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