“Everything is backwards now, like out there is the true world, and in here is the dream. ” – Jake Sully
Number of Times Seen – 3 (20 Dec 2009, Sep 2012 and 22 Jun 2014)
Brief Synopsis – A former marine who has no use of his legs volunteers to join a program meant to establish peaceful relations with the native inhabitants of a distant planet by use of modern technology and avatars.
My Take on it – I know that a lot of people have problems with this movie and its storyline, but the truth of the matter is that James Cameron has amazing vision for stories for movies (similar to George Lucas) but has trouble with the dialogue aspects.
The basic story is eerily similar to many other movies and stories from the past where a lonely man goes to a foreign culture, befriends them, falls in love and ultimately wants to fight for their cause. Most recently, one can think of this as Dances With Wolves (1990) or Pocahontas (1995) or even The Last Samurai (2001) in futuristic outer space.
The special effects are unbelievable and Cameron once again brings his A-game here giving us a cinematic delight in just about every aspects possible.
This movie is currently the all time box office champ and it broke the previous record set by Cameron’s previous venture Titanic (1997) twelve years earlier.
The unfortunate thing here is that I believe that this was a stronger and better movie than The Hurt Locker (2008) and had the script been tighter and slightly more original it might have had a chance to win best picture.
Bottom Line – Very entertaining movie with amazing special effects but the story itself isn’t so original. If the story had been slightly stronger it could have definitely won Best Picture. Highly recommended!
Rating – Oscar Worthy
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MovieRob 
Avatar’s special effects were amazing, I sure agree with that. The story was not originial. However, The Hurt Locker, done by Cameron’s ex-wife Kathryn Bigelow, was quite original story and a fantastic war film for intensity and cinematography. I was planning on writing a review for it in the near future. BTW, I forgot when you need the Hitchcock reviews for your blogathon? I had volunteered for Strangers on a Train….
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I enjoyed The Hurt Locker very much also, but I think overall this was a better movie even if the story wasn’t so original and felt transplanted.
Appreciate the comment Cindy
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Nice review Rob, but I must say that I honestly didn’t like Avatar AT ALL.
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what turned you off about it?
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The plot, the actors, the story, the presentation, THE LENGTH (and that’s saying something, I usually love a long movie). It was like… Pocahontas with blue people. I don’t know. I wanted to like it, it just didn’t actually work for me.
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it WAS Pocahontas with blue people. 🙂
I liked it much better than Pocahontas tho. Cared much more for the characters here then there.
In the theater, I saw it in 3D (which I always find distracting), but have seen the extended version both times since which were much better despite the extended length.
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Hehehehe, so then you see!
I saw it in theatre (they rereleased it here), and I was just really underwhelmed is all. I think I expected more, but I can understand why so many people love it and enjoy it.
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I see you too! 🙂
I think you understood it on a higher level than you think 🙂
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