Set in the 22nd Century, on a distant planet named Pandora, home to a race called the Navi. Sam Worthington (Terminator Salvation) plays Jake Sully, a paralysed marine, who is given the opportunity to become an ‘Avatar’, and help his fellow humans in searching for valuable minerals on the Navi home world. An ‘Avatar’ is a genetically engineered human-Navi hybrid.
While given a new lease of life as an Avatar, Jake unwittingly embarks on his mission on Pandora and finds himself falling in love with the Navi Neytiri (Zoe Saldana of recent Star Trek fame), he is also soon caught in the conflict between Earth and Pandora.
Avatar sounds like an amazing story and I think fans of the Sci-Fi genre would feel right at home with a tale like this one. But I can’t help feeling like I’m the only person who isn’t excited about this film, due to the sheer amount of Buzz this film is recieving.
Avatar is a concept dreamed up by Titanic writer James Cameron. Supposedly, Cameron had to wait 14 years to have this story finally told but I feel we could have waited another 14 years. However recent weeks have found Avatar shrouded in controversy, with Cameron being accused of plagiarism. Apparently Avatar isn’t so different from Poul Anderson’s short story ‘Call me Joe‘, from 1957.
Call me Joe also focuses on a paraplegic character who has a telepathic connection with an artifical life form on a distant planet, whose habitants are blue cat like creatures, similarities, yes indeed!
Avatar sounds intriguing, but nothing really surprises me about the look and over all feel of the film, maybe I’m being far too sceptical and how much can you really tell from a trailer?
But the Navi look far too cartoonish for my taste and perhaps slightly unbelievable.
This film has an all star cast joining Worthington and Saldana with Sigourney Weaver, Michelle Rodriguez and Giovanni Ribisi. Avatar hits theatres in December of this year. Here’s hoping I’m wrong and won’t be feeling as cold about Avatar as the trailer left me.
Buzz Anticipation Rating: 7/10
UK Release Date: 18th December 2009
Director: James Cameron
Writer: James Cameron
Links: IMDB, Official Movie Page
Fantastic film!! Absolutely loved watching it, although it definately did not feel like 3 hours!
I really admire James Cameron as a director. All his films has been masterpieces and ones that people will always remember and Avatar is also one of those films that will be remembered.
Absolutely worth those 14-15 years of making, I would watch it again!