Avatar

[AlexC1981]

I thought it was a great film to watch in 3d at the cinema, but I doubt that I will ever watch it on TV. What found most impressive about the 3d was that after a while, I hardly noticed it was there.

[Dr Phibes]

Watched it yesterday and have to say it is just a pretty formulaic action movie with average acting and a paper thin cheese tinted plot, at times it was like watching someone else playing an XBOX 360 game.

However the misses and my 12 yr old daughter really liked it, so it worked for the audience it was intended for. If you are a film snob (and I am) its crap to average if you can put aside, acting, plot, character development, camera technique, lighting, score etc then its good.

[T89 Callan]

Chimpy Chompies said:

I enjoyed it and when I get my arse in gear will buy it for the collection.

I think some folks on here are getting too high and mighty with their opinions as usual and not respecting others views, but then it is PH after all, so why am I surprised.

If you don't like it, don't watch it, retards.

How was I meant to know it was st until I had wasted £6 and 3 hours of my life?

[Nuclearsquash]

dxg said:

I think the fact that Michelle Rodriguez was wearing a corset (out of necessity, I guess, after all they're not exactly Marine standard issue) summed the experience up for me. Did anyone else notice that? (In the prison/hanger sequence...)

I'm pretty sure that was part of her flight suit, probably some kind of gee-suit type equipment as opposed to an actual corset.

[Bugeyeandy]

I really enjoyed it too but I do tend to enjoy all kinds of different films.

I get the impression at the moment that people think its cool to slate popular films regardless of whether they have actually seen them or not.

Maybe i've just got bad taste in films, Platoon is one of my all time favorites but when you disect the storyline it's actually pretty crap.

[Blue Meanie]

It is amazing how the main hyped up film of the last year or so has gotten such a reception. Who'd have thunked it. By the same logic I presume you have been extolling the virtues of other films you have enjoyed immensely, and been as critical of people who have considered them crap?

[Bugeyeandy]

Blue Meanie said:

It is amazing how the main hyped up film of the last year or so has gotten such a reception. Who'd have thunked it. By the same logic I presume you have been extolling the virtues of other films you have enjoyed immensely, and been as critical of people who have considered them crap?

None of that makes any sense at all. I don't understand you.

[Blue Meanie]

Bugeyeandy said:

Blue Meanie said:

It is amazing how the main hyped up film of the last year or so has gotten such a reception. Who'd have thunked it. By the same logic I presume you have been extolling the virtues of other films you have enjoyed immensely, and been as critical of people who have considered them crap?

None of that makes any sense at all. I don't understand you.

Well you seem averse to the notion of people criticizing films. The antithesis of that would be to extoll the virtues of films... I presume you have threads that do this other than this thread? Otherwise, you commenting just on avatar would fall rit into the bracket of "why are people commenting on avatar"

[mft]

Weslake-Monza said:

I can't believe so many people have slagged off this film. There are lots of rubbish films but no-one bothers to slag them off.

Not many similarly mediocre films are hailed as masterpieces, though.

[Bugeyeandy]

I think you're mixing me up with someone else Meanie, I merely said its fashionable to take a shot at Avatar not that I mind that people might not like it.

I commented on this thread with my opinions about Avatar funnily enough because its a thread about Avatar.

Going by your logic, you're purely on the thread to take a pop at people who like the film.

Opinions differ - who'd of thunk it

[Blue Meanie]

Sorry, yes I was mistaken. However, my gripe with that particular individual is purely because he seems to think that you can only comment on a film if you like it. Hence why we should find an abundance of comments with regards to films he does like.

As for your comment with regards to "fashionable to criticise popular films", I don;t think it has anything to do with that. People have said why they didn;t like the film. If you don't like it well there isn't anything we can do about that, is there.

And yup, I am in this thread because it is about Avatar, a film I happened to have seen, therefore able to comment on.

[toppstuff]

Avatar was a great technical achievement, but I agree that the storyline is predictable and has been done so many times before...

Because of this it was a massive disappointment. All that cash, all that time, all that effort to achieve such a high CGI standard was , for me, completely wasted because the technical side was squandered on a predictable story and frankly stupid narrative. I agree with the poster who suggested that it was like watching a video game intro that lasted 3 hours...

[Bugeyeandy]

toppstuff said:

Avatar was a great technical achievement, but I agree that the storyline is predictable and has been done so many times before...

Because of this it was a massive disappointment. All that cash, all that time, all that effort to achieve such a high CGI standard was , for me, completely wasted because the technical side was squandered on a predictable story and frankly stupid narrative. I agree with the poster who suggested that it was like watching a video game intro that lasted 3 hours...

I'd agree with most of that, the whole driving an alien body was the only original bit of the film (although no doubt someone will dig up another that's done it )
With an original storyline it would have been one of the all time greats rather than just enjoyable.

Meanie, cheers for your last post. Makes sense

Now, will Avatar the sequel be any good????

[stephen300o]

toppstuff said:

but I agree that the storyline is predictable and has been done so many times before...

[cough]James Bond[cough]

[mat205125]

Watched this at the weekend, and thought it was OK. I'd look forward to watching this at home, having deliberately avoided it at the cinema to ensure I could watch it on my TV with the correct audio - Apart from a visit to the Imax at Waterloo for The Dark Knight, I always find projected cinema pictures poor, and the audio meerly "loud" rather than "clean".

Anyway, I have to agree that the story lacked any real originality or depth, and it was immediately predictable from the outset. There wasn't a single plot twist or innovation in the whole two and a half hours!

As a "concept study" for the direction that cinematogrpahy will head in the future, then it served a purpose for Cameron - a prototype for special effects films for the future. I personally thought that it was too cartoon like, and appreciate the comment made by an earlier poster comparing it to the parts of a computer gain between the action (I'm sure those sections have a "gamer" name). The balance has shifted too far towards inserting human faces into computer generated imagery, rather than to use CGI as one of the tools to augment the captured cinema.

I guess I'd rather be intellectually stimulated by films rather than sit there for two and a half hours infront of a glorified light show.

ETA

I'd be interested to watch the "making-off" to appreciate the technical side of the film, and try to understand what proportion of what ended up on the screen was infact real, and not churned out of Cameron's laptop.

Edited by mat205125 on Tuesday 4th May 09:30

[RJDM3]

As far as story lines are concerned, this film was more Michael Bay than what you would usually expect from James Cameron. Visually this film was spectacular, but i do hope that in the next 2 follow ons they concentrate more on the story and depth of characters

[mat205125]

I kept thinking back to Aliens. Maybe because of the similarities and the designs of the drop ships. Mainly I kept recalling how believable Cameron was able to make some of the scenes with real people moving around real sets with 1:1 scale Drop Ship, APC, Loaders etc in Aliens, however equally how cheesy some of the older film's smaller scale model effects were.

[clarkeyboy]

Lots of Alines references if you look.From the loader rip off, the drop ship design to the score in the battle sequence. Plus Michelle Rodriquez could have actually been a direct descendant of Vasquez. The film was awesome in 3D and a pioneering film in that sense, but in terms of actual story and performance, entertaining but not exactly mind blowing. So many scenes which looked amazing in 3D but found wanting in 2D.

Edited by clarkeyboy on Tuesday 4th May 12:52

[mat205125]

Agreed 100% on the Vasquez observation. I was shocked that a humanoid android wasn't present

It'll be interesting to see how the film dates in years to come.

[clonmult]

toppstuff said:

Avatar was a great technical achievement, but I agree that the storyline is predictable and has been done so many times before...

Because of this it was a massive disappointment. All that cash, all that time, all that effort to achieve such a high CGI standard was , for me, completely wasted because the technical side was squandered on a predictable story and frankly stupid narrative. I agree with the poster who suggested that it was like watching a video game intro that lasted 3 hours...

I first watched it at home, obviously not in 3D, but I generally enjoyed it. First thought was that many of the themes were very similar to a mid-70s novel by Alan Dean Foster called "Midworld". Difference is that midworld had a stronger story.

But I can't bring myself to watch it again. Something about the film just doesn't grab me for repeated watching. Nothing in it really stands out. And the CGI is possibly the cause. At least in a game you can move around a bit, but watching Avatar is just like sitting there watching James Cameron playing the game.

And with the extended/directors cut version being on its way, that'll be just like watching him playing the game a second time.