Avatar

Real... but incredible too. Cameron delivered all I was expecting and much more. He embellished this simple or fairytale story (a dash of Pocahontas, a dash of Beauty and the Beast etc.) with an incredible amount of ideas and details that take your breath away. Of course, I made sure to watch Avatar at the IMAX and I must say that the movie really was created for 3D with a screen as large as possible. Pandora plucks you like a raspberry (parallel with Jake) and you feel the new world in all its beauty and unknown secrets and you want more and you get more. Each animal is more fascinating than the one you met before and every shot reveals new image after new image that remains ingrained in your memory. Luckily Jim didn’t skimp on technique and so we get the best performance from everybody. Militant and reckless humanity (represented by the great Ribisi) for destruction lovers and on the other end of the scale the naturally sweetened Na’vi race for beauty lovers (all the talk about ecological agitation are wrong, nothing specifically stands out, it all creates a whole where questions of racism etc. are also dealt with). All of this forms into a wonderfully working story and a breathtaking experience. I can’t remember seeing anything as intense (and anything that acts on all levels) for a really long time. I just noticed that I didn’t write about the special effects at all. Maybe because they didn’t seem like effects. They seemed real. When Neytiri cried, I felt with her like with a real person, not like with a nine-foot clown. She looks that real. So it should be said here that the effects are of the highest possible quality (if they are revolutionary or not, you’ll have to ask an expert in the field), personally I was completely gobsmacked, and I’ve seen a lot of movies. Almost all the actors shined, but Sam Worthington really was the best of them all. The nice guy who guides us on this wonderful journey without a doubt deserves great praise. As does Stephen Lang. A proper baddy who reels out one tough line after another. All in all, it was worth the wait. I felt like I was dreaming with my eyes open. I see you... (2009-12-21)

The first time my eyes saw the effects, they stayed still and gaped. Yes, artistically, the film may well be above reproach. A feast for the eyes. The effects simply must win an Oscar, I can't see it any other way. But after a while I got used to them, and they didn't dazzle me so much. For a film that runs 162 minutes, it has an incredibly weak plot. I'm truly sorry, but the effects just didn't hold my attention the whole time, after a while I started fidgeting, looking around at others, taking off and putting on 3D glasses, taking off, putting on a sweatshirt – I was bored. For me, there were just empty spaces. And don't let anyone try to tell me that through all the fabulous, nature-celebrating effects and digital advancements, Cameron can't offer a better story. He can – see, for example, Terminator. Plus, there were those awful pathetic "as if to the American people who are rising up, shouting, cheering, crying for glory, and rushing into battle to be slaughtered" speeches again – and I'm allergic to those, I just cringe. But one big plus for me is that he let the Pandorians have their own language, that he didn't force them all into English. I don't know, perfect effects aren't reason enough for me to give a better rating when I was bored and wishing they'd finally kill each other and live happily ever after. Ciaossu. Very, very interesting commentary: IMPAIRED (agree with almost all of it :-)) (2010-01-08)

Incredibly flawless and the most amazing cinema experience of my life. A film that erases the boundaries between the screen and the viewer and that lets you look into another world, to the point that it makes you want to believe Pandora is real. I expected a lot from Avatar and I had come to terms with the fact that such massive expectations could never be met, but the result actually surpassed them. This is something that I could have never imagined, even in my wildest fantasies, because up until now nobody had set a standard for the cinema screen according to which we could set our expectations. The story perhaps isn’t great, but it’s beautiful, classic in the best sense of the word, and certainly not worse than other blockbusters. And to be honest, I don’t think I would be able to watch something intricate, like Strange Days for instance, in this package. Once there are more comparable films, Avatar probably won’t be my favourite (due to personal genre preferences), but it will always be the first. Another viewing is mandatory, the cinema is mandatory, 3D is mandatory! Cameron was the king of the world, now he’s the emperor of the galaxy, next time he’ll reach at least god level, and after this experience, I’m almost certain he’ll pull it off. PS: The posers with prejudices like “I can’t be arsed with a fairytale about blue monkeys” will surely find plenty of things to criticise and I wish them the best wholeheartedly, they are only depriving themselves of the experience. PS2: The experience from the second viewing is at least the same. During the last 60 minutes those goosebumps hardly disappeared. (2009-12-18)

I do appreciate Cameron's dedication, which meant years of waiting for proper technology and the employment of two special effects giants. The result definitely marks a significant shift for cinema as a whole. Yet that's where the positives end for me... because then we get almost three hours of a shallow story (which could still be tolerated - okay, it’s a fairy tale), dull emotions, the most stupid military lines in history, and blue-green agitation so vigorous that even Greenpeace pales compared to it. The three-dimensional effect is great (Cameron knows how to work with space perfectly), but underneath the fancy tinsel I couldn't find anything more and about halfway through I wasn't even entertained. Sorry, but I was bored shitless with this film. Three stars from me. (2009-12-20)

Very, very intoxicating. What surprised me the most was that not only the eyes and ears experience an orgasmic throw. Personally, I felt emotion over the love affair between an earthling and a blue huntress, which I did not feel in the slightest when watching Titanic. Avatar is not just dazzling... it is alive. The film may have too much of the classic narrative schemes, but it doesn't matter, because the mind walks the familiar path and sight and hearing fly in the unimagined. There are probably many people who will point out things like activism, or that it is cold. I didn't see any of that in Avatar. Instead, what I saw was very light and brilliantly crafted telling of a romantic fairy tale about beings bound to their planet. Together with Star Trek, this year's clear winner in the heaviest weight category. [85%] P.S. I just can’t keep my mouth shut... I have a question:"A strange mixture of Moore's environmentalism, Zeman's poetics and Vinnetou's naivety "cut" with the aesthetics of The Lord of the Rings - does that mean Miloš Zeman, who embraces trees?" I probably haven’t seen as much from Karel as I had hoped. (2009-12-15)