Avatar Movie Review

A V A T A R
Director : James Cameron
Music Director : James Horner
Producer : James Cameron, Jon Landau
Starring : Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Stephen Lang, Michelle Rodriguez and others
Cinematography : Mauro Fiore

Performance:

Sam Worthington: Sam Worthington is pretty much perfect for the part he plays. He narrates a good part of the movie and has a voice with a bit of an attitude — yet still calming — that was needed to fit the bill.

Stephen Lang: who plays the tough-as-nails Colonel Miles Quaritch. If I were to picture in my mind the type of person who should have played Colonel Quaritch, it would be Stephen Lang.
Giovanni Ribisi: I found Giovanni Ribisi to be an odd choice to play the corporate weasel heading up the project. He just seemed a bit young for the part.

Zoe Saldana, Sigourney Weaver and Michelle Rodriguez all did a fine job but none of them were called upon to go over and above what you might expect from them. I had totally forgot CCH Pounder was in the cast and when I saw her name in the final credits, I still couldn’t picture her in the movie. I’ll have to look out for that the next time I see it.

Drawbacks:
There are some minor quibbles to be had here, especially in the film's opening moments as characters are laying out the premise. A voiceover might have worked better than awkward dialogue. And a Na'vi group prayer-chant thing veers too close to feeling like a bad "Matrix" moment.
Analysis:

Writing negative movie reviews is easy. Writing positive movie reviews is hard. Which means writing a review of "Avatar" is going to be really, really hard. Because James Cameron's alien world epic "Avatar" may well be the future of movies, it might change everything and it sure as heck raises the bar by at least 10 feet.

It is a dazzling spectacle that makes virtually all other special-effects blockbusters seem like awkward toddlers. In imagination, vision and execution suddenly every other action film looks like it was drawn with crayons.

Beyond that, though, it's also a rock-solid space yarn, revisiting themes -- man vs. nature, our self-destructive instincts, corporate malfeasance -- that Cameron explored in his sci-fi classics "The Terminator," "Aliens" and "Terminator 2: Judgment Day."

Dev's Verdict:

As I just mentioned, the story is decent, but it wasn’t exceptional. The characters are okay but besides Sam Worthington’s Sully, no one was very remarkable. Where this movie is head and shoulders above anything I have ever seen is in the special effects and in the imagination that it took to put it all together. For that, I have to tip my hat to James Cameron and friends. They really did some remarkable work on this film that should impress millions of movie fans around the world.

"It is an outstanding movie to watch and well worth the price of admission"
Verdict: Avatar is truly a master piece of filmmaking, a step ahead in visual effects that sets new standards. A must-watch film.