Avatar – Did James Cameron Raise The Bar Yet Again?

For science fiction movies, some names being involved stand out, and combined you just know you’re looking at a roller-coaster ride.

What do you think could result from a movie directed by James Cameron, co-starring Sigourney Weaver, scored by James Horner, sound laid down by Skywalker Sound, aliens and creatures designed by Stan Winston Studios, and choc-full of computer generated graphics courtesy of WETA of Lord of The Rings fame, Framestore, and ILM??

No need to imagine – just go watch ‘Avatar‘.

The movie is out in both normal and 3D versions – and the 3D one simply rocks your world!  Once you adjust to seeing the screen image through the polarized lenses needed, you’re sucked right into the alien world of Pandora and its inhabitants.

And what inhabitants they are!  Whether it ran along the ground, or flew high in the sky, each creature had an ethereal quality that was both believable and frighteningly realistic in its rendering.

Of course, you might expect nothing less from the creature shop of Stan Winston, and the animation shop of WETA (who brought Andy Serkis’ ‘Gollum’ to a heart-rending pitiful obsession rendering in the Lord Of The Rings Trilogy), but even so you can’t help but notice the quality of their efforts by the simple measure of not noticing they’re computer generated.

Looking at the faces of the human-controlled ‘Avatars’, biological constructs, it’s an eerie sense of seeing the faces of the actors, but different and – well, alien.  Sigourney Weaver looks like Sigourney Weaver, and that accurate transformation brings a level of familiarity that helps sell the whole concept even more in your mind – even though they look very alien, they’re still “human” in their mobility and expressiveness, allowing the cast the full range of their acting abilities.

From a technical standpoint, Avatar builds on the CG techniques we saw in the Lord of The Rings Trilogy, without letting them swallow the plot of the movie in any way.

Likewise, the 3D editing styles of the past, with cheap scares jumping out of the screen at the audience, is noticeably absent with Avatar.  Instead of those forced scares, the 3D is exploited in far more subtle ways, dragging the audience deeper into the screen and the world of Pandora – little things like glowing embers from fires drifting down in the foreground, so “close” you want to brush them away from your face.

The plot, on the other hand, does risk boiling down slightly to the “evil corporation plans on exploiting the poor alien race and resorts to violence to get its way” plotline – a neat link for Cameron and Weaver given their participation in “Aliens” many years ago.

It’s easy (as some have done) to shrug and say that Cameron was pushed into this plot style (he wrote Avatar as well as directed it), but to be honest after the lengths he went to with Titanic to get his “vision” for that movie through over objections from the studio, I think he really did keep it “simple” because it didn’t require complexity – it sells itself as itself.

Almost from the very start, however, we noticed that the alien society, practices and beliefs, and even some of their actions, were very reminiscent of Native American themes.  They even referred to themselves as “The People”, and thanked the spirits of creatures they hunted and killed for food for their sacrifice.

Is there a hidden morality tale in Avatar?¹  Perhaps, but at the end of the day Avatar remains an excellent excuse for a rock-and-roll combination of action and insight regardless.

I believe Cameron has raised the bar and shown the world with a resounding crash that the standards for movie making with such intensive Computer Generated Imagery have evolved far from the earlier days.  It has shown how “realism” can be produced using CG – although still at a high cost, at a reported $400 million to produce in this case.

But Cameron’s got a reputation for putting his money behind his belief for accuracy and authenticity in movies – and he’s yet to be proven wrong.

With Avatar, this “dream team” of movie making has also shown that the CG doesn’t have to detract from the story, but can assume its rightful place as another tool in a movie’s genesis.  I wanted to analyze the effects of Avatar, expected to play “How did they do …” but the truth is, I got sucked into the movie and I didn’t even notice the CG as such.

From the CG craft, to the alien life forms, right down to the magnificent and immense landscapes that fill the world of Pandora, the movie is virtually seamless.  When you watch it, you can imagine the world, just as much as you could imagine yourself on the deck of the Titanic.

I forsee a good number of fan sites and fanfic coming up soon as Avatar gets more penetration.

So will Avatar smash the box-office record set by Cameron with Titanic, reputed to be $1.4 billion?

I think it has a good chance.

If you want a movie to see this Christmas season, Avatar should be high on your list – even if you don’t “like” science-fiction, Avatar has something for you within its rich detailed fantasy universe.

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