James Cameron's Avatar

LazyClouds

Goodshape wrote: »

You were able to determine all that from 15 chopping and changing minutes taken from the first half of a purportedly near 3 hour long film? Impressive.

All I really saw was 'people go to alien planet', 'love interest', 'some sort of battle for some reason', 'lots of cool alien creatures and stuff'. Which is basically every film about going to an alien planet ever made.

I'd hardly me making judgements on the story based on that.

(although to be fair, and as others have said, signs do point towards some sort re-working of the classic Pocahontas story).

I don't think the storyline is difficult to predict: man becomes alien to better cope with surroundings, gets lost, finds alien natives, realizes aliens are people too, falls in love with other alien, fights for aliens against his own kind, loses identity, and then- A) wins fight against other humans and drives them away or creates peace, persuades humans that they shouldn't be fighting and creates peace, or C) dies with his new alien friends.

OR it's Fern Gully alien style.:rolleyes:

lostexpectation

Goodshape wrote: »

You were able to determine all that from 15 chopping and changing minutes taken from the first half of a purportedly near 3 hour long film? Impressive.

All I really saw was 'people go to alien planet', 'love interest', 'some sort of battle for some reason', 'lots of cool alien creatures and stuff'. Which is basically every film about going to an alien planet ever made.

I'd hardly me making judgements on the story based on that.

(although to be fair, and as others have said, signs do point towards some sort re-working of the classic Pocahontas story).

congratulations you've been the inspiration to finally add to my sig, its a discussion board people! Lets discuss. , i hate these, lets not comment on this or that, people

Goodshape

lostexpectation wrote: »

congratulations you've been the inspiration to finally add to my sig,[ B]its a discussion board people! Lets discuss. [/B], i hate these, lets not comment on this or that, people

Ok, I won't discuss my thoughts on peoples ability to determine and belittle a films story based on a fifteen minute preview. Because discussion is ba..

No, wait. What are you saying?

LazyClouds

@Goodshape and lostexpectation:

callmescratch

Goodshape wrote: »

You were able to determine all that from 15 chopping and changing minutes taken from the first half of a purportedly near 3 hour long film? Impressive.

All I really saw was 'people go to alien planet', 'love interest', 'some sort of battle for some reason', 'lots of cool alien creatures and stuff'. Which is basically every film about going to an alien planet ever made.

I'd hardly me making judgements on the story based on that.

(although to be fair, and as others have said, signs do point towards some sort re-working of the classic Pocahontas story).

I just thought that if there was a decent story, then 15 mins would have been ample opportunity to indicate that.
Instead we only saw nice shiny things and big explosions. They looked lovely and all, but there was absolutely no hint of a decent or in any way original story. Some movies can hint at a good story in a 30 second tv ad you know

projectmayhem

callmescratch wrote: »

I just thought that if there was a decent story, then 15 mins would have been ample opportunity to indicate that.
Instead we only saw nice shiny things and big explosions. They looked lovely and all, but there was absolutely no hint of a decent or in any way original story. Some movies can hint at a good story in a 30 second tv ad you know

Yes, and the trend of telling the story via 30 second trailers is beyond annoying. It's supposed to tease, not reveal all.

The 15 minute thing was an opportunity to show a film that NO ONE has seen anything of, and thus has no idea what to expect. It also showcases what, ideally, will be the supreme example of 3D technology in a film so far, since Cameron had this film with 3D in mind from the get-go. It should be pointed out that at the very beginning of the 15mins Cameron came on screen to say hello and pointed out that this would be spoiler free, to showcase the technology. "Have you all got your glasses on..."

I came out of the 15 minutes knowing very little. Good. It means I can go into December's showings without any knowledge of the story. All I know is why it's called Avatar and that the blue dudes are more simple/prehistoric, while humans are advanced with their guns and flying stuff. Then they all fight, it seems.

callmescratch

Well yeah, spoilers are bad.
Promoting the movie on more than its shiny awesomeness would be good tho. I'm sure that closer to the time, the proper trailers and reviews will flesh it out a bit more (or would that be spoiling it?), I just thought the 15 min preview the other day was a little unimpressive even if:

callmescratch wrote:

The 3D looked great and it's definitely gonna be worth going to in December.

See, I like sparkly things too. I just wanted it to have a good story is all

Goodshape

callmescratch wrote: »

I just thought that if there was a decent story, then 15 mins would have been ample opportunity to indicate that.

Cameron himself said in the intro that the 15 minutes would be spoiler free. I took this to mean free of any key story or plot details and, aside from the one's you simply can't get away from (alien planet, strange creatures, battle, love interest) I thought that's what was delivered. Just a little teaser for those that have been waiting years to find out what they've done with this technology - something the teaser trailer couldn't accurately portray.

Each to their own if you want to extrapolate or simply guess a story based on what you've seen so far... but I've certainly never seen a James Cameron action movie that lacked on the storyline.

callmescratch

Goodshape wrote: »

All I really saw was 'people go to alien planet', 'love interest', 'some sort of battle for some reason', 'lots of cool alien creatures and stuff'. Which is basically every film about going to an alien planet ever made.

I'd hardly me making judgements on the story based on that.

Isn't it fair to make the judgement that...

callmescratch wrote: »

The story didn't seem very special. It could be any other alien/monster/explosion movie by a generic director. Definitely nothing to get excited about.

...which is basically what you just said.

I know that Cameron himself said te 15 min thing would be spoiler free, but it would have been good to see that there was a less generic story. Maybe there's just nothing to spoil.

Lemon out!

Goodshape

Ah yeah, fair enough. It didn't give much to be excited about story-wise , it just didn't give much to be disappointed with story-wise either (imo) - which I thought was what you were saying - because it just didn't give much info on the how's and why's and motivation behind what was being shown.

Personally I love that in a trailer or teaser. The Matrix one always comes to mind -- "No one can tell you what the Matrix is.." zoooom.. woooshh.. swwiiishh.. -- ZOMG!! NOW I MUST KNOW!!11!one! ...shows the filmmakers have confidence in what they've got.

Mark Hamill

projectmayhem wrote: »

I came out of the 15 minutes knowing very little. Good. It means I can go into December's showings without any knowledge of the story. All I know is why it's called Avatar and that the blue dudes are more simple/prehistoric, while humans are advanced with their guns and flying stuff. Then they all fight, it seems.

I have only seen the teaser trailer, but it seemed to tell a lot more of the story that that (spoilered if you dont want to speculate):

Space fairing humans have discovered this planet and want something on it (probably some resource, maybe to do with the rocks floating). The blue aliens are in the way (they live in an area the humans want to build on, mine or something) so they need to get rid of them somehow. They decide to send in what I assume is the titles avatar is - a human beings mind inside and controling an aliens body (the character you control while playing a video game is sometimes called an avatar, so thats probably were it comes form). Sam Worthingtons character chooses to be the avatar because he is a cripple and controling the alien means he can walk again, however when he infiltrates the aliens to try and convince them to leave, he falls in love with one of them and this causes all sorts of problems when either 1) one of the aliens discovers the human base and a battle is started or 2) angry army general/self serving politician gets tired of waiting for worthingin and just decides to wipe out the blue aliens (note: how i think the battle might be started is just complete guesswork, not based on anything I saw in the trailer).

This of course could be miles away from what actually happens in the movie.

projectmayhem

Mark Hamill wrote: »

I have only seen the teaser trailer, but it seemed to tell a lot more of the story that that (spoilered if you dont want to speculate):

Space fairing humans have discovered this planet and want something on it (probably some resource, maybe to do with the rocks floating). The blue aliens are in the way (they live in an area the humans want to build on, mine or something) so they need to get rid of them somehow. They decide to send in what I assume is the titles avatar is - a human beings mind inside and controling an aliens body (the character you control while playing a video game is sometimes called an avatar, so thats probably were it comes form). Sam Worthingtons character chooses to be the avatar because he is a cripple and controling the alien means he can walk again, however when he infiltrates the aliens to try and convince them to leave, he falls in love with one of them and this causes all sorts of problems when either 1) one of the aliens discovers the human base and a battle is started or 2) angry army general/self serving politician gets tired of waiting for worthingin and just decides to wipe out the blue aliens (note: how i think the battle might be started is just complete guesswork, not based on anything I saw in the trailer).

This of course could be miles away from what actually happens in the movie.

Well, like I said, we now know why it's called Avatar. But as you say, the rest is speculative. Which is what a trailer should provide, speculation. Not a run down blow-by-blow account of the story.

lostexpectation

Goodshape wrote: »

Each to their own if you want to extrapolate or simply guess a story based on what you've seen so far...

Goodshape wrote: »

Y.

(although to be fair, and as others have said, signs do point towards some sort re-working of the classic Pocahontas story).

shame on you...

Goodshape

lostexpectation wrote: »

shame on you...

I was being 'fair' and having a look at the other side of the [not really an] argument. In other words, "I don't really want to guess at the story based on 15 minutes but if I did, the Pocahontas story seems like a decent one."


What is it with you?

LazyClouds

dooood, i think we should all just chill...

i wish i were blue. :rolleyes:
daba dee daba dye....
:cool:

Josey Wales

I wonder when advance booking will start for this in IMAX screens.

Linguo

Looking forward to this one, am trying not to build up expectations that are too high though incase I get disappointed!

Magic Eight Ball

Some people are hoping that Avatar can show them visuals that they’ve never seen before, something groundbreaking and game-changing.

Me? I just want the guy to tell a good story!!

callmescratch

Obviously a lot of stuff out there about Avatar, this is pretty funny tho - 10 Movies Avatar Unfortunately Resembles

(Don't shoot! Messenger!)

Edit - They seem to have left out Fern Gully, Pocahontas and Dances with Aliens. Don't they even read Boards.ie :rolleyes:

TinCool

callmescratch wrote: »

I just thought that if there was a decent story, then 15 mins would have been ample opportunity to indicate that.
Instead we only saw nice shiny things and big explosions. They looked lovely and all, but there was absolutely no hint of a decent or in any way original story. Some movies can hint at a good story in a 30 second tv ad you know

I'm sure Cameron is not letting any of the story away until the movie is actually released. This will naturally create hype for it's release. Think back to the months running up to Terminator 2 in 1991. None of the story was given away and the posters presented never hinted that Arnie's character would be the good guy.

lostexpectation

its not just us

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JAPyipuT-Jg

The Black Oil

Cameron's CV is annoying short. Aliens and The Terminator are great, but more than 20yrs old. The rest are alright, if a bit cheesy.

krudler

The Black Oil wrote: »

Cameron's CV is annoying short. Aliens and The Terminator are great, but more than 20yrs old. The rest are alright, if a bit cheesy.

A short CV it may be, but look at it

Piranha 2- Cheesy cheap debut

The Terminator- One of the most influential sci-fi movies of all time

Aliens- The best sci-fi/action film ever, did the impossible and matched its prequel for quality

The Abyss- Hugely underrated, famous for its brutal shoot and its hugely innovative and pioneering use of CGI

Terminator 2- Once the most expensive movies ever made, again a massive success and more pioneering CGI, a modern classic

True Lies- Was also at one time the most expensive movie ever made, huge fun and the jumpjet sequence still holds up

Titanic-Cheesy script nonwithstanding, a towering achievement in modern filmmaking, still the biggest movie of all time


Short, but quality over quantity

Patricide

krudler wrote: »

A short CV it may be, but look at it

Piranha 2- Cheesy cheap debut

The Terminator- One of the most influential sci-fi movies of all time

Aliens- The best sci-fi/action film ever, did the impossible and matched its prequel for quality

The Abyss- Hugely underrated, famous for its brutal shoot and its hugely innovative and pioneering use of CGI

Terminator 2- Once the most expensive movies ever made, again a massive success and more pioneering CGI, a modern classic

True Lies- Was also at one time the most expensive movie ever made, huge fun and the jumpjet sequence still holds up

Titanic-Cheesy script nonwithstanding, a towering achievement in modern filmmaking, still the biggest movie of all time


Short, but quality over quantity

Il second this quality over quantity every day, but i also agree with what hitler said above...Looks disappointing!

LazyClouds

Blue people rock!

krudler

callmescratch wrote: »

Obviously a lot of stuff out there about Avatar, this is pretty funny tho - 10 Movies Avatar Unfortunately Resembles

(Don't shoot! Messenger!)

Edit - They seem to have left out Fern Gully, Pocahontas and Dances with Aliens. Don't they even read Boards.ie :rolleyes:

That blog is really grasping at straws with some of those comparisons, "avatar and watchmen both have characters who are blue, kissing! its a ripoff!" angry internet fanboy ranting at its best, why bother waiting to see the movie and see if its any good when we can watch a 2 min trailer and judge it from that:rolleyes:

lostexpectation

well you see the delgo people are crying foul, which is a bit ridiculous and joblo over eggs it too, but look, we were promised visuals/concepts we'd never seen before
http://www.joblo.com/avatar-is-delgo
what we get is floating islands,flying dragons .... ho hum

who else is working on this movie can't find info on imdb

TheCardHolder

Saw the trailer in 3D today before the final destination. Looks so much more impressive than on a computer screen.

LazyClouds

TheCardHolder wrote: »

Saw the trailer in 3D today before the final destination. Looks so much more impressive than on a computer screen.

Saw it before final destination too, my friends failed to acknowledge it. but i was stunned! it looked great on the big screen.

final destination was sheeeeet. but it was no surprise.:o

hick

I saw the online trailer and was very disappointed, it's basically animation, then I said it might look different/better on the big screen.

Saw the theatrical trailer in Dundrum last night and I have to say I'm even more disappointed, this is not the next level of CG, surrogates looks to of done a better job than Avatar!
And if you're trying to convince yourself it will look better in 3D...nope, I saw 3d in disney 20 years ago that was as good and I was 12 then and impressed! Will take a bit more now.

bottom line if you like Animation then this is right up your street but that's not mass market, lemon, I afraid it might be. :eek:

This is no Matrix, crap i went to see that 3 times in the first week, now that was ground breaking!

Maybe just maybe they haven't rendered it fully.....