Man Movie Review: Avatar

Not Santa Clause movie, Chritmas songs, but the hottest film in town at end of this year, Avatar. Avatar has been a long time coming, not least because Cameron first got the idea more than a decade ago and he has not directed one since 1997’s Titanic.


He's had to wait all this time for technology to catch up to his vision of a strange alien world and the war for its precious resources, and has invented a lot of it to push everything from cameras to 3D techniques forward.

Looking at the actors alone, Sam Worthington is pretty much perfect for the part he plays. He narrates a good part of the movie and has a voice with a bit of an attitude — yet still calming — that was needed to fit the bill. The other actor that stands out is Stephen Lang, who plays the tough-as-nails Colonel Miles Quaritch.

If I were to picture in my mind the type of person who should have played Colonel Quaritch, it would be Stephen Lang. I found Giovanni Ribisi to be an odd choice to play the corporate weasel heading up the project. He just seemed a bit young for the part. Zoe Saldana, Sigourney Weaver and Michelle Rodriguez all did a fine job but none of them were called upon to go over and above what you might expect from them.

Now I'm think about it, the story line was pretty simple. The corporate bullies, with the help of the army, step in to take something valuable and they don’t care who they are inconveniencing by doing it. We’ve seen this a million times before on film and probably more times in real life. The only difference with Avatar is that it is happening on an alien planet, with a race of which we have never heard and with some of the best special effects we have ever seen.

In conclusion, if you didn’t already expect the special effects in this movie, the SFX are impeccable and he uses them well. Instead of just shoving them in your face, he weaves them into the story beautifully, and they come off effortlessly.

Find out where you can get this Avatar DVD if you intend to add this into your last piece of collection this year.