A technologically advanced civilization shows up in a previously virgin place full of highly desirable resources but the native and “primitive” population is sitting right on top of it and is unwilling to move. Naturally, this native population lives in harmony with nature while the new comers destroy everything in sight with no regards. One of the young newcomers falls in love with the native princess and has to straddle the line between two colliding worlds. In case you are wondering, this is not a review of Pocahontas or Dance with the Wolves but James Cameron’s new movie Avatar.

Avatar is set in 2154 AD on Pandora, a moon in the Alpha Centauri system which is home to the Na’vi, a “primitive” indigenous population of giant blue dudes and dudettes who are twice as tall as the average human being and quite frankly more awesome physically. The Na’vi live in complete harmony with their natural surroundings and only take what they need without wasting. Fortunately, some nameless corporation has set up a colony there to show them how it’s done back home in America. Pandora is also rich with Unobtainium (I’m not making that one up), a precious mineral for which humans will do anything for. Unfortunately, those stinky blue people live right on top of a massive quantity of this resource and that’s where the Avatar program comes in. In a diplomatic effort to solve the tense situation without turning the ground all blue and mushy, human scientists such as Dr. Grace Augustine (Sigourney Weaver) were able to create avatars, human-Na’vi hybrid clones, which can be mentally controlled by its human owner. Those Avatars can then used to gain the trust of the local populace and convince them to relocate. Jake Sully (Sam Worthington), a paraplegic Marine, is sent to take control of his now-defunct twin brother’s avatar. He visits the world of Pandora and is enamored to be able to use “his” legs again. Jake soon is transformed by this alien culture and falls in love with alien Neytiri (Zoe Saldana), who teaches him how to live in harmony with nature, and forces him to question his loyalties.

The highly anticipated Avatar has been in the works for some 15 years as James Cameron has been waiting for the technology to catch up to his vision of how the movie should look. The production cost which was reported to be around $237 million doesn’t make this movie the most expensive in history but add in $150 million for marketing and promotion and it does make for a pretty expensive price tag which may or may not be fully recouped. Anyways, let’s put it aside right away: I saw Avatar in 3D and it is a visual feast well beyond anything that can be seen currently and probably for the next 24 to 36 months. Much like seeing the liquid metal effect in Terminator 2 for the first time nearly twenty years ago, watching Avatar’s world will blow your mind the same way. The Na’vi computer-animated characters are as flawless and realistic as the real actors. The eerie world of Pandora is lush with strange looking vegetation, intriguing wildlife and those are so photo-realistic, it rarely looks like you are watching extended CGI sequences. The 3D glasses provided are fairly sturdy and decent but do dim the picture a little bit. When will we get non-dark 3D glasses or better… real 3D screens?

Avatar’s technical mastery is one brilliant aspect of the movie, however when you come back to basic story-telling principles the movie is overly predictable and uses too many cliches. Hang on to your seat because I will say it: Take away the phenomenal visuals and you have a fairly ordinary movie. Most of the turn of events are telegraphed from 10 miles away. The climactic 20-minute ending, although spectacular, is only an all-out battle scene with fancy explosions and military hardware. It feels like the story was used to showcase the visuals and not the other way around. There is a few feeble attempts here and there to lighten up the mood that extracted only a few soft chuckles from our audience. The movie also pushes a green agenda and attempt to comment on a profit-driven society that is pushing the Earth toward the breaking point but only in a very superficial way.

The characters are simplistic stereotypes that are never developed beyond the obvious. You have Colonel Quaritch (the fantastic Stephen Lang), a perfect stereotype of the gung-ho military officer who only wants to blow up everything in his path without any consideration whatsoever for anything but the body count of bad guys. Lang did a great job with a one-dimensional character making him larger than life and charismatic every time he appeared on screen but yet you have to be disappointed to have such a one-dimensional antagonist. You also have your usual arrogant corporate executive (Giovani Ribisi) who is predictably asked to look sorry and disgusted when his orders to blow everything up are followed. You have the geeky and slightly douchy scientist (Joel Moore) and I could go on and on. This is not to say that Avatar’s cast did terrible, far from that. Sam Worthington gives a worthy performance as Jake Sully and he looks primed to become Hollywood’s next big action movie star. James Cameron also continued his tradition of portraying strong women with Zoe Saldana who is entirely CGI-modeled and who gave an effective performance as Neytiri and provided a believable PG-13 romance. Sigourney Weaver and the heroic Michelle Rodriguez  complete the tough-as-nail female cast.

Last but not least, the musical score by James Horner is a bit questionable since the first few notes of his main score are recycled from the one from Titanic. I had Titanic’s main theme going full blast in my head every single time I heard those first few notes in the movie. Not a good thing… While the musical score for Titanic was haunting and emotional, the one for Avatar was mostly generic and did not elevate the movie at all.

Avatar is a bit too predictable and has a fairly ordinary story-line, however it is such a technical masterpiece that it is  still one of the top movies of the year. The gorgeous creation of the world of Pandora is by itself worth the price of admission. Here is to hope James Cameron doesn’t wait 12 years to come up with another movie.

B+

Notes: PG-13 (of course… can’t make the budget back with an R-rated movie), 162 minutes. Seen in digital 3D non-IMAX theater.