Avatar Breaks Even, Surprises Everyone

[MissAshley]

Um. . .Good for it?

Despite millions of dollars of marketing and hordes of favorable reviews, I simply have no desire to see this film. The plot, the effects, the creature designs. . .None of it grips me at all.

 

[ffxfriek]

In other news, Avatar is fucking awful!

How so, Care to elaborate a bit? It's good if you back up your opinion a bit instead of just yelling "FIRE!" and running away.

Personally, I thought it was a pretty good movie. Not AMAZING, but a damn fine 2.5 hours or so. The story was decent enough, the effects were cool, all that jazz. I didn't see it in 3D though I wish I did, probably would have been nifty.

Either way, it's good to know that the movie may have recouperated their loses from making it.

I saw it in 3D and it was amazing. Top 10 movies ive ever seen in my life.

 

[TotallyFake]

I'm saddened by this, yes the movie is pretty, but it's also predictable and way to long for what little subsentence it has, just saw it with my uncle on his annual "present" which is two tickets to a movie he wants to see, once you got pass the prettiness this movie was adequate.

its more like the crysis of movies, you owe it to yourself just to see what technology has made possible, but don't expect much beyond the visual. (who the hell expected duke nukem forever to be visually stunning, we only expected it to be the best game ever made)

The movie is adequate based on plotting, but gets points for being pretty? Surely that makes it a GoodMovie?

 

[matt87_50]

"disappointing those who hoped it might be the biggest flop of the decade."

who are these people? who would honestly hope that the next big James Cameron SciFi movie with the best special effects ever would be a flop. I want there names so I can murder them... slowly...

 

[Desert Tiger]

Wow ... I wish I had money like that. Hopefully James Cameron wont ruin this great movie by using the money to make a mediocre sequel

You mean he won't do a Lucas?

The navi could invade Earth, so he gets surgery to look like a human.

BAM! IT'S SO UNIQUE.

 

[Desert Tiger]

"disappointing those who hoped it might be the biggest flop of the decade."

who are these people? who would honestly hope that the next big James Cameron SciFi movie with the best special effects ever would be a flop. I want there names so I can murder them... slowly...

Yo dawg. I wanted it to flop because the story was incredibly weak and I don't want a trend of "well, that's okay as long the special effects are good!"

And the only way you're going to slowly kill me is through contributing to global warming, pal.

 

[Crayzor]

Hopefully he keeps his movie magic going. Cameron doesn't do sequels

Terminator 2 and Aliens?

Anyway, apparently he is planning two more Avatar films.

 

[dwoo21]

I loved the movie and I'm glad it did well.

 

[The Rogue Wolf]

Avatar, to me, was a safe and familiar story wrapped in an extremely beautiful package. I had a few facepalm moments myself regarding the plot, but when I watch a movie, one of my key measurements of quality is "watch-check time". How far into the movie can I get before I check my watch to see what time it is? For Avatar, this happened about 2 hours and 10 minutes in. That's pretty damn good, and was only beaten by the Lord of the Rings movies (in which I didn't check my watch until the credits rolled).

Being a tech-head, it's the technology that interests me the most. I've said before that this new CGI methodology hasn't reliably crossed the Uncanny Valley- the Na'vi are sufficiently different from humans so that any oddities could be dismissed as them simply being alien- but it certainly does a good job of simulating living, breathing creatures. I remember reading that Cameron once said, should Avatar do well, he would like to explore stories set on other moons of Polyphemus- that's the gas giant that Pandora orbits- which would likely mean entirely different sets of characters and creatures. Now that he has a proven hit on his hands, I'd love to see him challenge himself on the story side rather than the technology side.

 

[Netrosis]

I'm glad to see it broke even.

I'm certainly looking forward to the "making of" just as much as the movie itself, it even explains a lot of the plot.
Like how having Stereoscopic 3D with Circular Polarised lenses darkens the screen, and so the Night scenes would become very dark and washed out. So they brightened it up with wildlife that came to life.

I'm still quite sad though. I got about 2/3 of the way through the movie when I suffered a Panic Attack. (Social Phobia in a Crowded cinema = horrible feeling), I felt uncomfortable during the entirety of the film and eventually had to walk out and miss the ending I wanted to see so badly.

As for this whole "sequel" idea, I think its nice to want a sequel but feasibly, I can't see the storyline being any stronger than the first. While the movie was immersive, I just don't see myself going through it all again on a new world and being just as amazed.

This movie still has a while to go in cinemas and I know many people have already seen it twice.

I just wish this whole 3D stuff had been done earlier. The Matrix and Lord of the Rings trilogies would have been epic with this 3D tech behind them.

Also, WETA never fail to amaze, I think they've surpassed PIXAR in terms of the boundaries of Cinematic Animation & Immersion. Wouldn't say no to a career at that company but the hardest part would be waiting for all the awesome work to be released on the big screen.

 

[BlueK0]

I've seen it 4 times and have paid for 4 others to see it at $15.25 a ticket ($122)(all in IMAX 3D). I think you can tell I love it. And every one who has seen it with me (which I'm up to 9 people who have come with me)said the same. Now just imagine the technology that was used on this, used in a HALO movie. Come on Spielberg and Jackson - who both visited the AVATAR set and are both possibly going to work together to make the Halo movie.

 

[Death on Trapezoids]

Wow ... I wish I had money like that. Hopefully James Cameron wont ruin this great movie by using the money to make a mediocre sequel

i really can't see what the sequel could even be about.

James Cameron thinks the plot arc is large enough for 2 more.

The sequel would be about when the humans come back. You think that they are not going to try to get back what makes their oppulent lifestyles possible just because of some blue skinned natives? Also, it (or the one after that, hopefully) would probably be about Jake's children.

Edit: sorry Starfox44, Your post does a better job of this.

 

[Death on Trapezoids]

You could buy a lot of tacos with that money.

I didn't know CGI was so pricey, but I guess most of it was making it 3D.

The man invented his own fricken' CAMERA for this movie!

 

[ParadoxBG]

I find it amusing that one of the featured articles is Sean Sands' about not forgetting the people working hard behind the scenes on games and one of the first sentences here makes a Duke Nukem Forever joke.

That is pretty damn funny, actually. I didn't even think about that. Of course, I think a lot of articles in here make the same kind of jokes...

 

[NostalgiaImitator]

It was an expensive light show. If thats all you want out of movies you probably enjoyed Baysplosions Transformers Movies. If you want plot, twists, convincining and clever dialogue, non-hippie agenda, non-rip offs of Dances with Wolves I suggest you see something else.

Where do I begin? I saw one trailer and new what I was going to see so I bougth a ticket to another movie to see it. We all knew it was going to be a commune with nature, save the natives, bad imperialism movie. Personally I can't "link" with nature and I doubt you can so when I cut down a tree or step on grass I don't cry. Also the bullheaded unreasoning evil corporations bro, (smokes pot) bad for all of us and the environment, evil. CLEVER right there, that sounds like some college Berkley student take on modern day corporations and yada yada. Unfortunately for Cameron we all know this lesson and this isn't the 16th century where we are killing the natives for their land, lessons been learned.

Military fights make no sense, one minute they are laughing at how pathetic natives attacks are and mow them down and at the end they are getting owned. True story, military walkers are made with 1cm of unreinforced glass and arrows are a serious problem for them. And please, if they are so technologically advanced either nuke the natives from orbit or drill around the tree, if its so valuable I'm sure the extra money will pay off for it.

Then comes the basic fact, the guy is not fighting for some greater purpose, he is fighting for the girl. He loves blue females and he wants them, there is no depth to his "Oh but we must stand up for our rights and way of life and nature". It's sexual desire and we all can see that.

COntinuity errors, sterotypicaly military guys obviously meant to show that those in the army have no brains/lives don't matter comapred to blue furrys, over the top melodrama, tree hugging message aside this movie is visually stunning. However, some news agencies are reporting that its causing epiliptic fits and a couple of heart attacks. So I guess Cameron is also helping the excess population problem with this movie as well.

 

[Wicky_42]

Deus Ex Machina - Something that seems to be pulled out the Arse of the director that quite literally can't be explained. In the T-movies, both times, I can justify the fact that they had to get to the place, the lava is right there and that's burning hot.

For Avatar, we have no reason to believe in Eywa to have heard Jake. We have no reason to have thought she'd care. But magically when EVERYTHING is down, she gives a big middle finger to the humans. It may have been lampshaded in the fact that no one but the scientists thought of the planet as a giant computer, but damn... That's some serious DEM. I just wanted Eywa to show she cared one time before that big finale so I could say "oh, she does listen. Just sparingly." Instead, it's more a "WTF. So if I pray to God, he'll give me a large army whenever I need it?"

So, in T2 you're happy with a random event that just *happened* to save the heroes, who also *happened* to get chased down a freeway to the only facility in the city that could help them finish off the big bad?

Compare that to how in Avatar, we are frequently told that "Eywa provides", she delivers signs that Jake is special (her seeds flock to him), the Doctor's last words are "she is real" as she connects to Eywa, Jake interfaces directly with, asks her to look into the Doctor's memories, and warns her of the danger posed to the entire world.

Throw onto that the evidence the Doctor gathered that the entire planet is connected up as a living brain, thus easily capable of making Eywa a sentient being. Add in the 'inter-connected' aspect and you have an only slightly spiritual intervention at the end, with the animals being sent by Eywa in her defence. Presumably the Doctor was arguing Jake's side from within as well, and since there was "No green left on Earth" it's not hard to see why Eywa, largely made up by plants, would take the Na'vi's side.

I'm sorry if you missed the signs that were given, but there's more to explain it here than in the terminators, and it's hardly Deus Ex Machina, tbh.

 

[House_Vet]

this isn't the 16th century where we are killing the natives for their land, lessons been learned.

Military fights make no sense, one minute they are laughing at how pathetic natives attacks are and mow them down and at the end they are getting owned. True story, military walkers are made with 1cm of unreinforced glass and arrows are a serious problem for them. And please, if they are so technologically advanced either nuke the natives from orbit or drill around the tree, if its so valuable I'm sure the extra money will pay off for it.

Then comes the basic fact, the guy is not fighting for some greater purpose, he is fighting for the girl. He loves blue females and he wants them, there is no depth to his "Oh but we must stand up for our rights and way of life and nature". It's sexual desire and we all can see that.

COntinuity errors, sterotypicaly military guys obviously meant to show that those in the army have no brains/lives don't matter comapred to blue furrys, over the top melodrama, tree hugging message aside this movie is visually stunning. However, some news agencies are reporting that its causing epiliptic fits and a couple of heart attacks. So I guess Cameron is also helping the excess population problem with this movie as well.

"We are no longer killing the natives for their land"?? What kind of bubble are you living in?There was, as has recently been revealed, no evidence of WMD's in Iraq and yet we went in all guns blazing. Fan-bloody-tastic. We've really learned from those mistakes haven't we? Oil money is so potent in the west it's just unbelievable. In south america, multinational logging corporations are busily evicting the indians from the rainforest. Have we learnt our lessons here too?

Couldn't really see any continuity errors myself in the three times I've seen it so far. As far as I can tell, Jake and Neytiri's relationship is based on more than sex as otherwise he would have chosen another woman who didn't come with strings attached.

Finally: It's a FABLE, an allegory about man's inhumanity to man and the environment. This is why the army doesn't nuke the place; why the characters are stereotypes: They are meant to be identified with by a broad range of people and so cannot be too unusual in any particular area.

 

[Scumpernickle]

It was one of the best movies I've ever seen ever.