Avatar Review

So we finally saw Avatar yesterday. We'd been up in Northern California on vacation for the last two weeks and decided to wait until we came back to SD, to watch the movie in IMAX 3D. You'd think after all this time, there wouldn't be a long line to see this movie on a tuesday night..wrong! We came 45 minutes early to the IMAX theater in Mira Mesa and there were still at least 30 people ahead of us in line already. On a side note, IMAX theaters are EXPENSIVE! They charge six dollars for a small popcorn. Can you believe that??!! All in all, after buying the IMAX tickets, ordering two small waters, a small popcorn and twizzlers the total bill came to 60 bucks for two people. What is this world coming too??!!!

Ahem, sorry for that. Back to the movie. I was excited as I'd never seen a movie in 3D before besides Captain EO (which they're bringing back soon-yeay!), so I didn't know what to expect. It turned out to be one of the most visually entertaining experiences I've had at the movies.

The story is set in 2154 when earth has started mining other planets for resources. The main character, Jake Sully, is recruited by the government to infiltrate a group of feisty natives on a planet being mined for precious minerals. He goes undercover by inhabiting an alien form identical to the natives...and it goes from there. The CGI effects in this movie look great, which is more than you can say for a lot of movies these days (I'm looking at you, cheesy CGI gophers in Indiana Jones IV). But I think a lot of that has to do with the fact they used Weta the effects house Jackson used in Lord of the Rings. There are some great visual scenes, such as the one when Sully first inhabits his alien body, and when the humans begin attacking the natives. Also, the landscapes and creatures dreamed up in this movie are vibrantly colorful and dynamic.

The story has a good, basic plot that had some timely themes running through it, though nothing too distracting. The dialogue was a little corny at times, but I think that like Titanic, Cameron stuck to a simple plot so he could keep the focus on the main star of the film-the effects. Go see it!

Here's an interesting video about the making of this movie