Ever since I heard that creator of Aliens (my all time favorite sci-fi movie) was working on another production I was excited like a kid on Christmas. Today I finally had the opportunity to see the movie and although it's by no means related to fantasy genre I had to share my thoughts on it. Here's my review of James Cameron's Avatar!

In a star system far away from Earth there is a planet more beautiful than you may dare to imagine: Pandora. It's special not only because of the breathtaking sights (and atmosphere). Pandora holds two wonders: some kind of rock, which is incredibly valuable for Earthlings and more importantly, a race of intelligent species: the Na'vi. Those blue-skinned giants are living not much unlike the native Americans, when European colonists first arrived. They live in harmony with nature and have no interest in anything civilization has to offer.
Minor spoiler warning. If you haven't seen the trailer (above), you might want to skip next two paragraphs.
Unfortunately the natives are in the way of civilization and its hunger for resources. Humans have begun mining operations on Pandora to extract the valuable rock. Not surprisingly, the rich nodes of the rock are sitting right under the natives village. Leader of the mining expedition is hoping that natives can be influenced to move to another area. This is where avatars come in.

Bio-engineered human-na'vi hybrids, which can be remotely operated as "surrogate bodies", are called avatars. Through one of those avatars the main character establishes contact with natives, learns their ways, becomes one of them, and finally turns against greedy and ruthless humanity.

You've seen and read this story many times before. Avatar's plot is the only thing that is not outstanding. There is a reason why this movie was compared with "Dancing with the wolves". I'm not going to lie to you, it's the same story all over. There are no surprises, no shocking twists and turns of the plot. It begins, evolves and ends just like you'd expect. It's not boring though and the way story is told will keep you entertained, I promise.

Now that I have shared the thing I enjoyed the least about Avatar lets take a look at the rest of the movie. One thing that everyone who has seen it will tell you (and I mean EVERYONE): Pandora is incredible. There is no way to describe it. This place is really magical. Fauna and flora of the planet has been designed from the scratch and made beautiful. You will want to see Avatar just to have the experience of exploring this place. And you will want to see it in 3D, because what's lacking in plot Cameron compensates in technology. I think it's safe to say that never computer created scenery looked so good. In this aspect the movie really is setting a new standard.

Amazing views of the alien world are not the only thing Avatar has to offer. The characters, both real and animated, deliver a stellar performance, starting with Sam Worthington playing crippled marine, Jake Sully, through legendary Sigourney Weaver (that's right, Aliens!), Michelle Rodriguez, and finishing on Zoe Saldana, playing the Na'vi princess Neytiri. Just to give you an idea, special effects for Avatar were made by Weta Digital, the same studio which created Gollum for Peter Jackson's The Lord of The Rings. Both avatars and Na'vi give a performance, that quickly makes you forget that the blue faces are computer generated. And no wonder Jake fell for Neytiri, Na'vi princess is both cute and smoking hot! ;-)

If you're not convinced yet, let me remind you that Avatar is a movie written and directed by James Cameron. There are many things that can be said about Cameron (lots of nasty things as well), but you can't say that he doesn't know how to make good movies. Whether your taste is sci-fi (Terminator), thriller (Aliens), comedy (True Lies) or romance (Titanic) James knows how to do it and how to do it well. Avatar, even though it picks up a story that has been told many times before is able to keep the viewer interested every step of the way. It's funny where it needs to be, it's emotional where it's required and it keeps you on the edge of your seat when the fighting begins. It's even free of the most annoying feature of the blockbuster productions, the pseudo-climactic "he's dead! he's dead! oh no, he isn't!" effect. As rare as it is nowadays, I didn't feel like I'm treated like an idiot.

I could go on for hours describing every little thing I liked about Avatar, the attention to detail (avatars have five fingers where Na'vi have four or the fact that Jake's legs are horribly atrophied), incredible, Cameron-specific sci-fi touches (the way mech's and gunships look like) or heart gripping dialogue sequences and comedic accents. I could go on for hours, but instead, I'll just say this:

To say that I liked the Avatar would be an understatement. I think it's one of the best sci-fi movies I've ever seen. I can't say that it's THE best sci-fi movie I've seen though. There is one thing lacking, a brand new, original and exciting plot. Without it Avatar is "only" a magnificent remake that you want to watch over and over again. And then few times more.

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