Reflections from the pensieve

Whenever James Cameron hits the screen he creates a marvel, he who has created beauties like Terminator and Titanic creates an awesome visual treat or should I say visual extravaganza or (lemme reword one more time) a whole new experience of movie viewing. Avatar though has a pretty ordinary story something which from start to the climax is predictable but it has something more breathtaking, an awesome treat to its viewers, the 3D effect. I bet you have never been treated to anything like this before, ever, period.
When I first saw the trailers which was specifically in 2D I never thought Cameron could pull off a beauty, on first thought I never thought Avatar would be a beauty, I thought I would be watching yet another sci-fi animated stuff. But Cameron has proved again that whenever he serves something on the table its special, whenever he’s there he creates a whole new cinematic experience for all people, young, old, not so old you name it; be it be the machine in Terminator or the unsinkable yet sinking behemoth Titanic, you end up with an awe. I was very curious to watch it, rather dying to watch it when I heard it was made on a whopping 230mn USD budget, now that my dear friends is 10 times our bollywood flick. (Bollywood for sure can never reach that extreme of movie making which Hollywood has excelled in). Sorry for digressing lemme come back to the most awaited movie Avatar.
The story is simple and you can check what it is, I m not going to spend time on explaining the story. In short men go to another world and try to invade it for their purpose. Men plant Sam aka Jake Sully into the tribal people who defects and becomes a part of the tribe. Men and the tribal people led by Jake enter into a war for their own objectives, the war ends with inhabits winning it. The war seems to depict the Vietnamese American war where Americans with all their might couldn’t match the determination of the Vietnamese and eventually had to pull out, while many of the critics observed that the movie drew a parallel from the American freedom war from their British brethren. Well, quite rightly member of the same clan goes against in a bid for freedom, to live freely. U can predict the climax easily, you know who is gonna win and who is gonna lose, you know who might be part of the collateral damage, but the way the climax has been shot is nothing short of marvelous.
The real marvel is the effects, the (virtual ) planet Pandora is brought to reality in such a marvelous form that you are left gaping. Yes dear friend I don’t think I have seen anything as beautiful or should I say as beautifully picturized. The flowers, the trees, the creatures, the Navi’s, the floating mountains, the Avatars, the rides, all are so amazing that you can’t even check your watch, for the fear you might miss something. It’s beautiful people, it really is.
I can’t say much about the thespians here as most of the characters are animated, but the animation never lets you feel its animation here, though you can’t make out a Sam Worthington as an Avatar when compared to the real him. James created/built/sourced a new camera to capture the motion to recreate it into animation and it really pays off the dividends. So his Avatar does a good job, and so does Grace, a scientist. Zoe pulls off a tremendous role in Avatar, being the daughter of the Navi tribal leader, to being a lover to being a amazing hunter. You fight when Zoe does, you can relate to what Zoe feels, when she is emotional, you are enthralled when she does a roller coaster on her ride. The beauty of the animated character is, it looks hell real. All others are as good. Not to mention the role of the hardlined Colonel Miles Quaritch that Stephen Lang plays, the only human who gets the majority of screen presence time as a human. Tough, straight no bullshit Stephen Lang plays it really well; he would have done a better job in Inglorious Basterds than Mr. Brad Pitt.
Avatar was hit even before it was screened anywhere in the world. The initial trailers which were 2 mins though were not that great but caught the attention, added to all of this were the claims of the movie’s budget, some sources estimating it to be over 500 mn USD as well and ofcourse it had to be Cameron backing a project like this. The word of mouth spread quickly and Avatar was in “I must watch it” list soon.
There are few movies post to which you feel an awe about them, you wanna watch them again and again and Avatar is one of them. Treat yourself a whole new visual experience. I can’t describe it. It’s simply a class apart. And yes watch it exclusively in a 3D.