$2,743,577,587. That’s how much Avatar, James Cameron’s 2009 CGI extravaganza, made in its original theatrical release. And unlike Cameron’s previous box-office monster, Titanic (1997), and nearly every other film that’s grossed over $1 billion, Avatar is not based on a preexisting story or intellectual property. It is Cameron’s idea, his screenplay, and his vision. That’s legitimately impressive. And perplexing. How did this film set an all-time box-office record?
Scientists and soldiers have come to Pandora, an alien world in Alpha Centauri. Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) is a paraplegic veteran filling in for his deceased twin brother in a research mission. The scientists, under Dr. Grace Augustine (Sigourney Weaver), want to study Pandora’s environment and the indigenous Na’vi tribes. To brave the Pandoran wilderness, the researchers remotely pilot Na’vi-like bodies called Avatars. Through his Avatar, Jake gains the ability to walk and run, but also freedom and purpose. He meets Neytiri (Zoe Saldaña), daughter of Na’vi tribal leaders, and she shows him their way of life.
At this point, the film’s selling points are clear: the visuals and the world-building. Most of the landscapes, characters, vehicles, and sequences are computer-generated. It’s a landmark movie in that regard: few films that came before relied on this technology so much. And Pandora is simply spectacular: colossal plants, frightening megafauna, and bioluminescence everywhere. The Na’vi are likeable, too: blue humanoids with catlike features, including twitchy ears. They’re certainly cooler than Jake, who has the personality of damp newspaper.
Meanwhile, the military, led by Colonel Miles Quaritch (Stephen Lang), wants to mine Pandora for unobtanium (yes, that is its real name), and Jake uses his newfound knowledge of the Na’vi to help. Col. Quaritch could not be a more obvious antagonist: a hawkish xenophobe constantly menacing the camera and everyone around him, more a caricature than a character. Saturday-morning cartoon villains have more depth.
Neytiri emphasizes to Jake the Na’vi’s reverence for nature, introducing the film’s environmentalist theme and a conflict between the scientists and the military. Later scenes of environmental destruction play like tragedy. It’s a fine sentiment, but ironically, Avatar’s technological foundations taint this pro-nature message.
The character animation, for example, is primarily motion-capture, and the movements and facial expressions plunge Avatar into the Uncanny Valley. Worse, the cinematography is nauseating. In nearly every shot, particularly on Pandora, the camera jerks and tumbles like the camera operator is getting attacked by bees. Even the calmer, more serious scenes look like this. And that’s when the camera follows the laws of physics. It all makes the film too synthetic and unnatural for its own message.
Also, strangely, nearly every line of dialogue sounds artificial, like the characters speak exclusively in catchphrases. This monotonous grandiloquence further robs the movie of realism and makes it emotionally weaker. With a story this simple, that’s a fatal misstep.
Avatar was certainly extraordinary on debut, but thirteen years later, it’s like a mediocre video game: dated graphics, cheesy dialogue, and a bland story. Maybe Avatar 2 will be better.
