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Rottenwatch: AVATAR (82%)

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New York Times review (spoiler free): http://movies.nytimes.com/2009/12/18/movies/18avatar.html

After a few minutes the novelty of people and objects hovering above the row in front of you wears off, and you tend not to notice the 3-D, which speaks to the subtlety of its use and potential future applications. Mr. Cameron might like to play with high-tech gadgets, but he’s an old-fashioned filmmaker at heart, and he wants us to get as lost in his fictional paradise as Jake eventually does. On the face of it there might seem something absurd about a movie that asks you to thrill to a natural world made almost entirely out of zeroes and ones (and that feeds you an anticorporate line in a corporately financed entertainment). But one of the pleasures of the movies is that they transport us, as Neytiri does with Jake, into imaginary realms, into Eden and over the rainbow to Oz.

If the story of a paradise found and potentially lost feels resonant, it’s because “Avatar” is as much about our Earth as the universe that Mr. Cameron has invented. But the movie’s truer meaning is in the audacity of its filmmaking.

Few films return us to the lost world of our first cinematic experiences, to that magical moment when movies really were bigger than life (instead of iPhone size), if only because we were children. Movies rarely carry us away, few even try. They entertain and instruct and sometimes enlighten. Some attempt to overwhelm us, but their efforts are usually a matter of volume. What’s often missing is awe, something Mr. Cameron has, after an absence from Hollywood, returned to the screen with a vengeance. He hasn’t changed cinema, but with blue people and pink blooms he has confirmed its wonder.
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ToxicAdam said:
Well, I'm only showing up 45 minutes early tomorrow night. I will report in this thread how that worked out for me.
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I'm planning on showing up at least an hour early for my 10:45 PM showing. That's a late showing but it's a Friday night, so it should be packed. Last thing I want to do for a movie like this is sit in an inconvenient spot.

Then again, I wonder if the 3D mitigates that issue some since it fills out your peripherals more. It's probably a bigger deal if you're going to a real IMAX, since you probably don't want to be sitting in the first few rows there.
 
Came back from the theater just now. Watched it in IMAX 3D and when I say that I'm impressed I am simply lying. There are not enough words to describe what I just witnessed. Sure, the storyline isn't as special or innovative as it could've been and there are a few plot points that could've been stretched out more, simply because they would've been pretty interesting.

But I watched this movie and for three hours I wasn't in my seat, sipping on my bottle of Nestea and awkwardly making hand movements that reflected irritatingly in my 3D glasses. For three hours I was on Pandora, I was on a world that does not exist, but looks and feels like it is very real indeed. I met the Na'Vi, a beautiful species that look as human as we do. When they laugh there is an actual twinkle in their eye and their mouth moves just as ours. I don't think I just watched a movie, I experienced it. Just as Jake Sully was introduced to the most magical world the history of cinema has ever had the honor to meet, was I introduced to an alternate reality, an alternate dimension, in which evil is evil and good is good, and one in which the beauty of life is sacred.

Thank you James Cameron and all the wonderful people who participated on this movie, for amazing me.
 
Pizza Luigi said:
Came back from the theater just now. Watched it in IMAX 3D and when I say that I'm impressed I am simply lying. There are not enough words to describe what I just witnessed. Sure, the storyline isn't as special or innovative as it could've been and there are a few plot points that could've been stretched out more, simply because they would've been pretty interesting.

But I watched this movie and for three hours I wasn't in my seat, sipping on my bottle of Nestea and awkwardly making hand movements that reflected irritatingly in my 3D glasses. For three hours I was on Pandora, I was on a world that does not exist, but looks and feels like it is very real indeed. I met the Na'Vi, a beautiful species that look as human as we do. When they laugh there is an actual twinkle in their eye and their mouth moves just as ours. I don't think I just watched a movie, I experienced it. Just as Jake Sully was introduced to the most magical world the history of cinema has ever had the honor to meet, was I introduced to an alternate reality, an alternate dimension, in which evil is evil and good is good, and one in which the beauty of life is sacred.

Thank you James Cameron and all the wonderful people who participated on this movie, for amazing me.
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Easy on the Cheese Pizza, Luigi. :lol
 
From the NY Times review:

The most important of these are the Na’vi, and while their movements can bring to mind old-fashioned stop-motion animation, their faces are a triumph of tech innovation, with tremors and twitches that make them immediately appealing and empathetic. By the time Neytiri ushers Jake into her world of wonders — a lush dreamscape filled with kaleidoscopic and bioluminescent flora and fauna, with pink jellyfishlike creatures that hang in the air and pleated orange flowers that snap shut like parasols — you are deep in the Na’vi-land. It’s a world that looks as if it had been created by someone who’s watched a lot of Jacques Cousteau television or, like Mr. Cameron, done a lot of diving.
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Pandora is influenced by the underwater flora and fauna in our oceans.... so awesome.
 
Dabookerman said:
When was the last time this much crow was eaten?
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Probably the thread where everybody complained about Heath Ledger being cast as the Joker.

That said, the type of crow being eaten here is different than usual. The film is doing pretty much what people expected it to do, but it's doing those things to a higher level than people anticipated.
 
rhino4evr said:
Easy on the Cheese Pizza, Luigi. :lol
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Have you seen the movie? I'm normally pretty skeptical about these kinds of movies, especially when there is some retarded made-up language involved (see LOTR) which is spoken if the speaker lost their tongue in a dangerous fight with monkeys carrying guns, and I also do not like weird faces and entirely computer-animated movies that I just cannot relate to. It's the pure fact that everything you see on screen FEELS real that astounded me.

And it's a weird place for a comma :P
 
irfan said:
I expect everyone (well most GAFFers) here to eat crow. :lol :D
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This. Not me though, you can check my post history in that trailer thread. I remember a while back how somebody posted a hypothetical where "if avatar flops then x" and then a certain poster quoted and changed it to "when" avatar flops and said "fixed". I forget who it was though.
 
Pizza Luigi said:
Came back from the theater just now. Watched it in IMAX 3D and when I say that I'm impressed I am simply lying. There are not enough words to describe what I just witnessed. Sure, the storyline isn't as special or innovative as it could've been and there are a few plot points that could've been stretched out more, simply because they would've been pretty interesting.

But I watched this movie and for three hours I wasn't in my seat, sipping on my bottle of Nestea and awkwardly making hand movements that reflected irritatingly in my 3D glasses. For three hours I was on Pandora, I was on a world that does not exist, but looks and feels like it is very real indeed. I met the Na'Vi, a beautiful species that look as human as we do. When they laugh there is an actual twinkle in their eye and their mouth moves just as ours. I don't think I just watched a movie, I experienced it. Just as Jake Sully was introduced to the most magical world the history of cinema has ever had the honor to meet, was I introduced to an alternate reality, an alternate dimension, in which evil is evil and good is good, and one in which the beauty of life is sacred.

Thank you James Cameron and all the wonderful people who participated on this movie, for amazing me.
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WOW...sounds awesome!

Dabookerman said:
When was the last time this much crow was eaten?
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KZ2 ;)
 
Pizza Luigi said:
Have you seen the movie? I'm normally pretty skeptical about these kinds of movies, especially when there is some retarded made-up language involved (see LOTR) which is spoken if the speaker lost their tongue in a dangerous fight with monkeys carrying guns, and I also do not like weird faces and entirely computer-animated movies that I just cannot relate to. It's the pure fact that everything you see on screen FEELS real that astounded me.

And it's a weird place for a comma :P
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Retarded language? LOTR?
 
Snowman Prophet of Doom said:
Probably the thread where everybody complained about Heath Ledger being cast as the Joker.

That said, the type of crow being eaten here is different than usual. The film is doing pretty much what people expected it to do, but it's doing those things to a higher level than people anticipated.
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There are plenty of people who pretty much expected (if not outright hoped) it to be a complete disaster.

Back around Comic Con in August, even the tech was being trivialized. Remember people trying to say that Davey Jones is a much more impressive technological feat?
 
Hey it happened in my theatre. A few light claps after the credit title (lol font) and then the whole IMAX theatre erupted into applause.

and IMAX 3D (true) is definitely the way to see this movie. The 3D and brightntess are completely clear, which I wasn't expecting after A Christmas Carol.
 
CassidyIzABeast said:
can't wait to start a slow clap after the credits roll:D
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Dude, you won't take the credits, that song is BAD. However, you get about ten seconds where the word 'AVATAR' is in massive writing before the song starts. Get some fucking slow clapping in there.
 
WJD said:
So, general opinion: is this any good?
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Oh hell yes. Not to overhype it or anything, but immediately after the credits I started planning when to see it again.

This does not happen often for me with films at the cinema. Usually there are films where I wouldn't mind seeing again, and some where I'd have to think over whether I'd want to sit through it again even though I enjoyed it. But rarely one that makes me so certain I want to see it again.
 
hirokazu said:
Oh hell yes. Not to overhype it or anything, but immediately after the credits I started planning when to see it again.

This does not happen often for me with films at the cinema. Usually there are films where I wouldn't mind seeing again, and some where I'd have to think over whether I'd want to sit through it again even though I enjoyed it. But rarely one that makes me so certain I want to see it again.
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Yeah me too, first time I've ever done that, I ordered tickets in the car on the way back.
 
hirokazu said:
Oh hell yes. Not to overhype it or anything, but immediately after the credits I started planning when to see it again.

This does not happen often for me with films at the cinema. Usually there are films where I wouldn't mind seeing again, and some where I'd have to think over whether I'd want to sit through it again even though I enjoyed it. But rarely one that makes me so certain I want to see it again.
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Goddam, I hate mixed opinions.

How are the blue things handled? They're the only things that have really put me off wanting to watch this from watching the trailers.
 
Karma Kramer said:
I am a little pissed off at Horner... Cameron should have gotten Clint Manshall instead... oh god that would have made me cream my pants
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I don't see it happening since the score was nominated for a golden globe and Cameron will see that as Horner's doing a job well done, but I really hope he fucking drops Horner after this. There are many, many better composers working today.

Titanic had a great score, as did Aliens, but fuck me the guy is lazy now. I can't believe he pumped out the Aliens score in 3 weeks and the fucker had the better part of a year to work on this and fucked it up.
 
Does anyone feel like Cameron intentionally made the Na'Vi physically un-settling and "furry" like so that it would prove a greater point about racism? I mean I personally think the Na'Vi look badass just judging from the trailer, and I am not saying you're racist if you don't like the Na'Vi... but Cameron being a smart man had to have known such design would receive backlash... so I wonder if this was all part of a greater plan maybe...? Get people to skeptically go into the theater thinking "man those blue things sure are weird/stupid looking" and then to hopefully leave the movie completely in love with them.
 
Karma Kramer said:
Does anyone feel like Cameron intentionally made the Na'Vi physically un-settling and "furry" like so that it would prove a greater point about racism? I mean I personally think the Na'Vi look badass just judging from the trailer, and I am not saying you're racist if you don't like the Na'Vi... but Cameron being a smart man had to have known such design would receive backlash... so I wonder if this was all part of a greater plan maybe...? Get people to skeptically go into the theater thinking "man those blue things sure are weird/stupid looking" and then to hopefully leave the movie completely in love with them.
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Honestly I just think he thought people, with tails because tails emote very well, they're blue because this planet is basically an ocean bed without the water, and massive because they need to be able to fight against men with superior weaponry. But maybe.
 
Okay people, I just got AVATAR'd.

First off:

qqpl35.gif


Second:

cameron.jpg


Return of the king, baby.

Forget the CG, the 3D, and any other techincal aspect of this. Simply put it's just a fucking awesome movie. I won't bother spoiling any moment of the movie.

Now let's get on to all the crap I told you to forget. :P The 3D was beautifully done. One drawback of previous 3D movies that I've mentioned here is that it distracts and that it's never clear where to focus your view on. I was never distracted in Avatar. I'm not sure how JC did it, but he accomplished this feat. Also, a few 3D-composited shots are quite mindblowing and would totally not work in 2D. They would just be another frame of the picture. But in 3D HOLY CRAP. I'm a believer of 3D now, but not an apologist mind you. :P Avatar still suffers a couple of technical issues that plagues current 3D projection: dimmer lighting and not entirely accurate color reproduction. Once that shit is somehow figured out it's over for 2D film making.

The CG is just amazing and there's absolutely no way it can lose at the Oscars. It looks real. That's it.

Watch this in 3D.
 
jett said:
Okay people, I just got AVATAR'd.

First off:

qqpl35.gif


Second:

cameron.jpg


Return of the king, baby.

Forget the CG, the 3D, and any other techincal aspect of this. Simply put it's just a fucking awesome movie. I won't bother spoiling any moment of the movie.

Now let's get on to all the crap I told you to forget. :P The 3D was beautifully done. One drawback of previous 3D movies that I've mentioned here is that it distracts and that it's never clear where to focus your view on. I was never distracted in Avatar. I'm not sure how JC did it, but he accomplished this feat. Also, a few 3D-composited shots are quite mindblowing and would totally not work in 2D. They would just be another frame of the picture. But in 3D HOLY CRAP. I'm a believer of 3D now, but not an apologist mind you. :P Avatar still suffers a couple of technical issues that plagues current 3D projection: dimmer lighting and not entirely accurate color reproduction. Once that shit is somehow figured out it's over for 2D film making.

The CG is just amazing and there's absolutely no way it can lose at the Oscars. It looks real. That's it.

Watch this in 3D.
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:lol

Wow jett convinced and blown away! This should be in the OP! :lol

Glad you enjoyed it mate. I'm seeing it again later today.

Here is an article where Cameron and cast give a few tidbits as to what was cut from the final print and should be restored for the dvd/blu: http://www.mtv.com/movies/news/articles/1628491/story.jhtml

Karma Kramer said:
Where did you see this Jett? Real D?
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Yeah, jett doesn't have access to IMAX where he is.
 
Karma Kramer said:
Does anyone feel like Cameron intentionally made the Na'Vi physically un-settling and "furry" like so that it would prove a greater point about racism? I mean I personally think the Na'Vi look badass just judging from the trailer, and I am not saying you're racist if you don't like the Na'Vi... but Cameron being a smart man had to have known such design would receive backlash... so I wonder if this was all part of a greater plan maybe...? Get people to skeptically go into the theater thinking "man those blue things sure are weird/stupid looking" and then to hopefully leave the movie completely in love with them.
Click to expand...
It takes a special person to be that cynical and I don't see Cameron as a cynic. Honestly I think he just wanted a design that was otherworldy yet with enough humanoid features so that the audience could buy a romantic relationship and connect with them emotionally.

EDIT: HOLY FUCK it won Jett over like THAT?

wow.
 
Okay good... I've never been to the RealD theater I am going to, so the screen better be a good size and the sound better be loud! I am so close to regretting not just doing IMAX first, but my plan is now to absorb it all in smooth RealD first (sober lol) and then for the next viewing smoke a joint and go to the fucking IMAX! yeaaahh
 
God damn...a positive review from Jett means this shit is going to make trillions if not quadrillions of dollars...:lol

Tonight's the night, baby!
 
Dabookerman said:
When was the last time this much crow was eaten?
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Well, I can't say much about the other crowivores, but I'm willing to stake out my position before I see the movie.

I have since the trailer and the early impressions fully expected to be underwhelmed by this movie. I'm sure its a visual masterpiece but I highly doubt it will overcome the weakness in story and dialogue that I've heard alluded to (and kinda glossed over, not sure if its a hype or a taste thing). I just tend to value those elements far more than all the visual spectacle in the world (although I liked The Rundown so go figure)

So, in the interest of intellectual honesty, I'll come back to this thread after I see it and you all can mock me mercilessly if I like. Just don't accuse me of making myself dislike it if I come out on the other side, ok?
 
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