Avatar Sucks.

I really couldn't come up with a better title for this post. I just got back from the moviehouse with a really bad taste in my mouth because that's what happens when you spend three hours eating a massive, steaming plate of gilded shit.

I suppose I should begin by stating my expectations when I entered. I had heard that sci-fi snobs were tending not to like the film, but everyone else liked it. The reasons for the sci-fi snobs disdain centered mostly around the typical problems with movies billed as sci-fi that really aren't sci-fi: an unoriginal plot in a fanciful-futuristic setting with non-humans who act just like humans. Okay, I thought, so it's not really sci-fi, and it won't be original. But that doesn't keep it from being entertaining, right?

Wrong. Disney has come up with better plots than Avatar. And I don't mean the kick-ass Disney of old that produced shit like Dumbo and Peter Pan. I don't mean the Disney that made all those great movies about classic fairy tales (Aladin included.) I mean the Disney that, seeing the success they had with turning Hamlet into The Lion King, decided that they should rake in obscene amounts of dough by taking any piece of classic literature at random; mutilating the plot as much as necessary to make it have a happy ending, fit the MPAA's "G" rating, and be understandable by children just old enough to be self-aware; mutilating the plot some more to fit in a weapons-grade-stupid joke every forty-five seconds, things like necessity or historical context be damned; slapping on a heavy layer of Judeo-Christian moralism, original cultural context be damned; and coercing some big-name talent into the cast so that the critics have to take it seriously. The Disney for whom Pixar was an artistic godsend. That Disney had better plots than Avatar. It's just the same old plot about a guy who gets sent to convince the natives to give up their land and ends up going native and fighting against the Manifest Destiny fatcats who sent him. Nothing added, nothing changed, just that straight-up, tired old formula. Cinematically, it shouldn't need any more than thirty minutes.

So what was done with the two and a half hours not spent advancing the plot? It certainly wasn't character development. I just saw the damn movie, and I don't even remember anybody's name. Every character was either a stereotype or a nonentity. I was expecting the natives to be the most cartoonish thing about the film, but no. It was the human villain whom I will call Colonel Hardass because I can't remember his fucking name. And therein lies my greatest disappointment with Avatar. If you're going to make such an airheaded movie, at least put Star Trek - level effort into designing and developing the villain. (And I mean the Original Series, not the recent film.)

No, the entire three-hour runtime was spent saying "Hey, look what we can do with all these shiny new toys!" There is no denying that Avatar is a visually spectacular film. But that's why I called it a massive, steaming plate of gilded shit. It's shiny, it looks pretty on the surface, but it's still shit. If I wanted fantastic visual effects, they have plenty of trippy kaleidoscopic screensavers aimed at the stoner market. There are professional fireworks displays visible from my backyard every Independence Day. But that's not what I'm looking for when I go to see a movie. I want an entertaining story with vivid characters.

Yes, James Cameron, your special effects penis is bigger than anyone else's. Now spend a little less time waving it our collective faces and a little more time making a decent fucking movie.