9
votes
‘Avatar 2’ stuns press in rave first reactions: ‘Visual masterpiece,‘ ‘mind-blowing,’ ’never doubt’ James Cameron
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- Authors
- Zack Sharf
- Published
- Dec 6 2022
- Word count
- 763 words
Okay. Except everyone loved the first one, too ... for a minute. Then the special effects wore off and they realized it was just Dances With Wolves with aliens.
First one has gone through a bit of a reevaluation. Avatar is just Dances With Wolves/Pocahontas was the standard internet opinion until maybe two to three years ago. That stopped being the circle jerky opinion more or less around the time of Scorsese’s comments about Marvel movies. Now, both the Avatar movies and James Cameron have become the purveyors of real cinema.
This new landscape is also the reason Top Gun: Maverick is currently the fifth most awarded film of the year by critics.
Avatar is one of only 2 movies I have ever watched in a theater twice. (the other was the first Matrix) It is visually spectacular, which I don't think anyone ever disputed. It is not the pinnacle of cinema, but I still think it is a good movie (though I haven't watched in over a decade at this point).
The main criticism that is often lofted is "it's just Dances With Wolves in Space" is not wrong, but also I think it misses the mark. There are only 7 stories in the world, everything is derivative of something else, and that's ok. What makes the difference is how well the story is told. IMO Cameron told this story very well, some others disagree and that's fine.
There is absolutely some solid criticisms of the underlying story itself that are warranted (white savior trope, etc), but I view that as separate from "how well did the movie tell the story"?
I always ascribed to "FernGully in Space," overall I felt it was much closer comparison.
I think it's very telling that Avatar is reevaluated into a good movie at the same time that Top Gun: Maverick is being highly awarded.
It’s not like Avatar was ever considered a bad movie. It just became an internet punching bag because it became the highest grossing movie. The winds started to change thanks to no style blockbusters though.
And because of a very valid critique of the prevalence of 3D. I don't know what the general consensus is on 3D now, but I feel like it was a fad that made the movie watching experience worse
I always felt the Dances with Wolves/Pocahontas comparison was about as lazy as those peddling it were accusing Avatar of being.
The Lion King was essentially MacBeth with cats, but that didn't stop it from being a great film. These observations are amusing and help draw useful cultural connections, but they say very little about the actual quality of the film in question.
Avatar is not perfect film, but I don't think the plot's passing similarity to a few other famous movies is one of its problems. I think some of what it lacks in character depth or unique plotlines is made up for by exceptional worldbuilding and Cameron's eye for spectacle.