Set on Pandora, which appears to be a moon orbiting a large gas giant. I'm not sure of what significance the name is, other than possibly that the alien moon promises to be a major headache (Major Headache) for the corporation trying to mine it. They are looking for the unimaginatively named "Unobtainium" which happens to be stored in large deposits under the home of a native tribe of intelligent aliens. The human tech is nicely put together, though it is effectively the flying machines from 'Halo' and the mechs from 'The Matrix Revolutions'.
I suppose this planet has a smaller mass, as most of its ground life is heavily inspired by that of the deep sea.
I've heard a lot about how great the world building here is, and how amazing the animals are. while they're far from boring, I've seen far more imaginative alien ecosystems - you know, ones that are alien, as in bearing as little resemblance as possible to us. its cool that everything has an extra two limbs though, the monkeys have four arms, that the Brontotheres are big, the anemones are huge and grow in the rainforest, and everything is bio-luminescent.
- Oh. OK, there are floating mountains. Definitely lighter gravity then.
The aliens are very Native American. Even the bit at the end where they travel (around
exactly how much of the world?) collective different tribes. I could
have done with some other cultures for them to be based around, or even a
completely invented one. Their language sounded natural though, was it invented in entirety, like Klingon or Elvish? well done writers, if so. It is also a little unclear how much the natives understand the ins and outs of the avatar hybrid bodies. They seem to get the general idea, but where does the guy get time to any rest? Unless avataring counts as RAM sleep, or something.
I
think it could have done with some ambiguity as to who to root for, but
the humans are portrayed as all-out bad. There was even ominous "nah
nah nahhhh" music playing as the marines disembark from the heli-things. I loved scar face though, he gets a few really cheesy lines in this movie. I liked the image of him absentmindedly patting out the fire on his shoulder as he gets into a mech.
Some of the dialogue is a little off, but the acting is good for the most part.
Overall a nicely imagined world with some excellent effects. The plot is unoriginal and the ending felt like a cheat, but the characters were all good and the acting was mostly great. The best aspect of this movie were the effects - which from me isn't a put down, but in all other aspects it was a little over hyped. Moral wise it feels sort of anti-American, but done in an extremely American way, so the result feels odd.
Oh yeah, and if I was company guy at the end there, there's an obvious resolution here - nuke the surface from orbit and then problem solved, no?
Avatar: 65.0