Tuesday 4 June 2019

Avatar 10 Years On

It is hard to believe that Avatar was released in 2009 - in both senses in which that can be true. On the one hand it's difficult to accept that it's not just yesterday. And yet on the other it feels like several eons have passed since it came out.

The overwhelming sensation, though, is a vague doubt that it ever even came out at all. What happened to Avatar? Where did it go? Considering that it is the highest-grossing film of all time, it's amazing that it's so rarely mentioned: when was the last time Avatar came up in conversation in your hearing?

I have a soft spot for James Cameron's films in general and Avatar in particular. In a way, there is a lot of the George Lucas about him: the end product may be dreadful, but at least he seems like he's trying do do something grand and original and amazing. There's a peculiar honour in George Lucas's tilting-at-windmills endeavours with the Star Wars prequels (terrible as they are), and James Cameron is frequently the same. Avatar is dreadfully flawed. But, at the same time, wow. That is the sensation that I left the cinema with after having watched it, and the sensation I still vaguely remember now: Wow. The script was dreadful. The plot was formulaic. The acting was wooden. But still, the spectacle was quite something.

Here was a man who not only did something BIG, but sensed it. Doing something BIG in itself isn't enough, of course - just watch the John Carter film, or Oliver Stone's Alexander, for instance. But Avatar is more than that. There's feeling in it too. I think in the final analysis that's what carries it over the line: James Cameron's own emotional investment in the project which finds its way through the Hollywood machine, the money, the special effects, the awful cliches, and communicates itself to the audience - in the thinnest of whispers, but communicated nonetheless. He really wanted to make Dances with Wolves in space with blue aliens, god damn it, and he will carry you along with him, come what may.

I am uplifted by Avatar. There is so much wrong with it. But the sheer genuineness of it shines through. It sweeps you along. I can't tell you why, any more than I can tell you why the first Star Wars film does. All I can tell you is that enthusiasm counts for a lot, and that even on a project as big as Avatar undoubtedly was, it can still manage to make itself felt.

27 comments:

  1. There's no "was" about it - he's about to release like 6 more Avatars! https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000116/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1

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    1. He is the GRRM of film-making now. I bet they'll never come out.

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  2. Agreed, its fascinating to see him constantly push the envelope technologically while having the strength of will to fight the suits and make his movies his own (for good or will). Sadly, in the same Lucasian way, he whiffs as often as he hits with regards to writing; half the time hes daedalus, and the other icarus haha

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    1. I think sadly now Lucas is in the position where his whiffs have outnumbered his hits...

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  3. Avatar is also the ONLY movie that I have seen that is better in 3D. It certainly helps that Avatar was specifically made for 3D, whereas most of the other films were converted to 3D as an afterthought.

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    1. Cameron's big mistake was creating a way for folks to film in 2D and convert to half-arsed 3D which flooded the market with bad 3D conversions that weren't properly planned and ended up giving 3D something of a bad name.

      Or perhaps the move was genius if selling the conversions helped pay for the new movies and he has some new technological trick up his sleeves for the new ones. It's not wise to underestimate that guy.

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    2. I actually only saw it in 2D at the cinema because I was (and still am, for what it's worth) boycotting 3D films. It was still an amazing spectacle.

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  4. I can't quite go along with the heights of even your guarded praise. I just didn't "get" the emotional sweep you're hinting at -- I'd say Titanic came a lot closer to that in my book, whatever its flaws. But there's no denying the breathtaking look of Avatar, and that may be the simple explanation for its lack of a cultural footprint. There's just not that much to say about it over the water cooler than:

    "Man, that looked amazing!"

    "Yeah!"

    "Really INCREDIBLE!"

    "Yeah!"

    ...

    "So, what else have you seen lately?"

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    1. The only bit in Titanic I enjoyed was the sinking. But he did pull that off with bravado.

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  5. I would also add Ridley Scott's prequels. "at least he seems like he's trying do do something grand and original and amazing"

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    1. I really enjoyed the prequels.

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    2. I still haven't got around to seeing them. Give me 10 years and I might end up posting a review.

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  6. There is a guy in my town who has a full Avatar wrap for his pickup truck.

    And has tattooed himself blue.

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  7. I actually passed a teenager today wearing a beat-up Avatar t-shirt.
    Couldn’t sit thru the movie however, I just felt it was meh. And I just learned that James Cameron didn’t direct Say Anything or Singles...

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    1. As director he only really had a great run with the Terminator films, Aliens and the Abyss.

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  8. The Disney rides are pretty cool.

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  9. Probably the best film rendition of the Roger Dean aesthetic ever.

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    1. Yes! Now there's an idea for a blog post...

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  10. I thought the movie looked great but it was simply gosh darned awful.

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  11. I found the film technically impressive, but I felt like I was missing something. Maybe it's because I grew up seeing a lot of animation, but even with how good the the CGI in Avatar was (and still is!) it never took me out of the uncanny valley. I can definitely see your point on how apparent Cameron's passion was, though. I just wish the screenwriting staff had picked up the memo.

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  12. I loved Avatar, and I thought a lot of the criticism of it was in bad faith. Anyway, whether coincidentally or not, the 'Green Star' series by Lin Carter has a quite similar premise.

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    1. I just looked up that series. It is a cheesy but very cool premise. Might have to track it down.

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  13. I remember watching Avatar, thinking "hmm, that was actually pretty great", only to be driven out of the theatre by Leona Lewis earnestly singing about seeing people.

    So many moments, like the first shot that properly explores the 3D being this weird deep focus shot of the ship he wakes up in.

    It was that shot, not on pandora, but this moment before the rest of the plot has been established, where you can share the protagonist's disorientation by looking at this moment.

    But it isn't gif-able, and doesn't work as a 2D still; it holds its position like a piece of music, by how the scope suddenly expands, and some of its effect comes from it being the first well done 3D film I'd ever seen, and unlike say the circular running scene from 2001, it holds its purpose as an emotional moment connecting you to the character's emotional state, not a free standing aesthetic iconic thing.

    Everything about the film is tuned to getting you to associate with this otherwise super boring video game protagonist, with shots echoing how he feels etc. And when you come away, you're kind of like "But do I care about that guy and his blue girlfriend anyway?"

    It's kind of too earnest and simple to parody properly, and aesthetically complex and integrated enough that actually producing a plausible reproduction for the purpose of parody is surprisingly hard, such that it isn't really worth it, though I'm sure the endless new films will probably provide more on that front.

    So talking about it isn't that interesting, because there's not much to talk about on a writing level, the performances are so in character for the actors they feel like they are playing themselves, and some of it's best moments don't feel like much separated from the whole, so it doesn't really have much to hang on in popular culture, except for, of course, papyrus.

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    1. That's a good analysis.

      Cameron is very good at doing that - using the scenery and locations of objects within it - to connect you to the emotional state of the characters. I'm not sure whether that's what people who know about these things call mise-en-scene?

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  14. Actually, you know what, this whole arrival sequence is still incredible, even in 2D.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zuVTJNALwQ

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    1. As I think I said somewhere above, I only saw it in 2D. I was still blown away by it and loved that intro sequence. I've still not seen it in 3D.

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