Speaking frankly, I understand your enjoyment, but I have reached the point where FX simply isn’t enough. I have seen enough surface-pretty films for one lifetime and I much prefer films with emotional depth, intellectual honesty and spiritual truth.
James Cameron has none of these qualities and so, no matter how pretty his film, I simply don’t want to bother.
That’s just me, of course, but I think it is a point of view people might really profit from considering (it might save them some money and time, too).
>>Speaking frankly, I understand your enjoyment, but I have reached the point where FX simply isn’t enough.<<
I’m with you on that one. That is why I stayed away so long. It is also why I compared it to Star Wars. Both brought visuals to the table that were unheard of at the time. That made them worth it. But now I’ve seen it.
Same was true of CGI movies. It was only in the couple of years that I realized that I had just assumed that if a movie was CGI it would be good. And at first, they mostly were. But now they are like the rest of them. They need more than CGI to get your attention.
Avatar delivers on the visual side in a way it has not been seen before. That has value to the moviegoer as well as the producer.
>>I much prefer films with emotional depth, intellectual honesty and spiritual truth.<<
Movies are like books for me. Sometimes I read fiction and sometimes I read non-fiction. I’m not always looking for depth of story in a movie, but sometimes I am. My “desert island” movie is “That Thing You Do” BECAUSE it is simple, one dimensional, and is just fun.
I go to different movies for different reasons.
So James Cameron was just on the View Wednesday morning, and he was disarmingly frank about the premise and purpose of his film, Avatar. He plainly explained it was anti-corporate, and that his goal was to take that "subversive" message, and wrap it up in an entertaining vehicle in a way that America, or the world, would swallow it whole.
I admire the guy for admitting that. But I just don't see the subversion he's talking about. I can't remember the last time I saw a "pro-corporate" movie, which to me would be truly subversive. I mean, can you imagine a director making a film about a drug company that works tirelessly to come up with medications that saves millions of lives? That's happened in real life - more than a couple of times. Still, no movie. However, Hollywood craps out a pro-environmental, anti-big business flick faster than I can say "Pass the Charmin."
And I can say that pretty fast.
Anyway, I saw Avatar, and being from Fox News, naturally I rooted against the Navi. Not because they were holistic earthers. I just hated all the jewelry. It reminded me of a spa I went to in Santa Fe. Still, it was a great flick - as long as you separate fact from fantasy. In Cameron's fantasy, Marines become mercenaries who arrive to a peaceful place and destroy it. In our reality - around the same time that flick was making millions - Marines were actually landing in Haiti, saving lives during one of the worst tragedies in recent memory. In the world of make believe, we are evil. In the real world, we aren't so bad.
I don't expect the idiots who watch the View to get that. But I'm sure the rest of us do.
And if you disagree with me, you're probably a Navi-hating homophobe who kills blue people for fun.