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Thread: Avatar 2009

  1. #46
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    The Titanic and Avatar Phenomena

    When Titanic came out in in 1997 people oohed and ahhed at the dazzling special effects and the nearly perpendicular death falls of passengers, this was a huge epic love story pasted on the background of a huge dizzying set and for a while the audience was transported much like an extended Disneyland ride into a world outside of themselves and away from their current lives. Today in 2010, America and now the world are again enthralled in another visual entertainment ride transported far away for a couple of hours away from the terrible worries and anxieties of reality by the dazzling special effects and another love story and American-based fairytale in outerspace. Nevertheless, both Titanic and Avatar are just that - amazing visual entertainment rides that allow us to turn off our minds and absorb the visual images and forget our real world for a few moments, hope for a better future with images of perhaps experiencing some moral uplift in ourselves. Whether or not the audience afterwards has really been intellectually stimulated with a truly layered and qualitatively substantive script with any depth is another matter. Yes, both Titanic and Avatar were phemonena but so were the Wall Street Crash and executive bonuses, UFO Balloon ride, and the Palin Vice Presidential campaign, and the death of Princess Diana or the television coverage of OJ Simpson's trial.

  2. #47
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    I'll be seeing this within the next two weeks in 3-D in Toronto. (Hopefully in IMAX too).
    I'll be good and ready for it by then.
    I know I'll like.
    "Set the controls for the heart of the Sun" - Pink Floyd

  3. #48
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    I just finished the article on "Avatar" in the January issue of ASC magazine "American Cinematographer." Cameron used the experience from his two previous films, "Ghosts of the abyss" and "Aliens of the deep" to perfect his use of 3-D camera work. One might even assert he made those films as practice for "Avatar." By the time he hired cinematographer Mauro Fiore, Cameron knew more about photographing with the process than his photographer (Fiore: "This entire production was extraordinary, the most extraordinary experience of my career so far...If you’re going to delve into new technology and a new world, Jim Cameron is the guy to do it with.") The article on the production goes into the technical problems Cameron faced on the set, which were monumental. Also revealed is the question of a sequel. Evidently Cameron wrote another script simultaneously with "Avatar" called "Battle Angel" which he plans now as a possible sequel to "Avatar" although its plot has nothin in common with the other film (Although he said in an article recently he plans two sequels to "Avatar" where the characters explore the nearby moon).

    Cameron is nominated this year for a DGA Award (presented Saturday January 30)

    While "Book of Eli" took Friday night (11 million to Avatar's 10), Avatar's domestic gross just passed 460 million which will make Cameron's films the two highest grossing box films of all time.

    Here is further reading on "Avatar"..............

    ACS article: http://www.theasc.com/magazine_dynam...atar/page1.php

    Avatar on Wikepedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avatar_(2009_film)

    Directors Guild of America: http://www.dga.org/index2.php3?chg=
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  4. #49
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    The 3-D Phenomenon

    We started last year with Chris and I debating the direction of 3-D films, with Chris getting me to pull back on my belief that 3-D films were becoming a permanent and important phenomenon. Whether or not 3-D films will become an essential part of the film landscape, particularly when it comes to non-action movies, remains to be seen. Nevertheless, the technology seems to always to be improving and money seems to help a lot with some exceptions (WATERWORLD). Yet, behind all the feverish work on technology and the glorification of fantastic scenery, it seems that American's lust for something new and supposedly exciting remains ever present. Video games, virtual reality (movies such as THE CELL and BRAINSTORM) will always point to more and other movies that will succeed in surpassing these marvels of visual delight leaving in its wake and fading memory of has been movies. AVATAR is likely not to be exempt from this category, particularly as this movie is so heavily dependent on them as opposed to the more endaring TITANIC storyline and ending scene and musical score. 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY for all the time that has passed retains is power and authenticity regardless of all the fancy new special effects technology. Here there was a commitment to authentic realism in a sci fi back drop that was layered in scientific realism without 3-D or other visual delights except the ending - where the musical score really supported the LSD experience.
    Last edited by tabuno; 01-17-2010 at 02:13 PM. Reason: Grammatical

  5. #50
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    I am not impressed by 3D; I don't think it adds as much as its supporters think. But whatever my personal opinion may be, anyway AVATAR clearly provides 3D/iMax viewers with a tunning experience, and that may be the main thing the film has to offer, given it's conventional plot. But a friend pointed out to me that what's exciting about AVATAR visually is more due to other technologies, often explained in promotional videos for the film -- all kinds of new special cameras and processing methods that permitted the blending of CGI, motion-captuire figures, and directly filmed people to be integrated into a single scene seamlessly and convincingly. And also the beauty of some of the images, like the glowing blue in the one i used with my review, and the invented flora and fauna of the land of the Na'vi.

  6. #51
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    Is everybody watching the Golden Globes tonight?

    James Cameron said in an interview that Avatar is meant to be seen as a 3-D experience.
    I must see it the way it is meant to be seen. Can't wait to get back to Toronto to check it out.
    Will definitely post about it after I see it. (finally)
    "Set the controls for the heart of the Sun" - Pink Floyd

  7. #52
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    Quote Originally Posted by cinemabon View Post
    Notes: rather than a pre-publicity column, this thread is for film criticism and review, please don't take offense, Johann.http://movies.nytimes.com/2009/12/18...vatar.html?hpw

    No offense taken.
    But incidentally, why is pre-publicity a bad thing?
    I find it curious that you initially were anti-Avatar and then you swung 180 degrees on it.
    You were sniping before you saw a scene! Then you became it's biggest champion here...
    That's funny.

    I'm looking very forward to seeing it/experiencing it.
    "Set the controls for the heart of the Sun" - Pink Floyd

  8. #53
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    It's obvious to anybody, even someone as little interested in the AVATAR phenom as I, that the movie was planned as 3D from the start, and that's one of the reasons its completion was delayed, till improvements in the techniques of making 3D movies came through. However, as I just mentioned, AVATAR is really interesting for other techniques used in its making, used to integrate motion-capture, CGI, and directo film of humans seamlessly into a film, and enabling actors to see the artificial creatures they were interacting with in the scene as they shot it.

    But after all, great silent films were made, and the advent of color did not mean better movies, just different ones. Maybe I'd like 3D if it didn't look like my grandmother's stereopticon pictures that you held up to your eyes and if you didn't have to wear those silly Fifties cardboard specs that darken the images and pinch your nose when you watch.

  9. #54
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    James Cameron deservedly took Best Director at the Golden Globes (and humbly). I did do a 180 on this film because it really impressed me as something quite unique when I saw the 3D presentation.

    I called my mother today, as I do every Sunday. Last week, she went to an IMAX theater in Florida and saw Avatar. She was seven when they installed the first sound projectors in our home town. The year was 1929. I wondered what she would say about a 3D film at her age. This is what she said to me...

    "I don't understand why everyone doesn't go to see this... because in all of my life, I don't believe I have ever seen anything as beautiful as that."

    Thanks, mom.
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  10. #55
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    Thank you, Hollywood Foreign Press, for the honor... Best Picture of the year




    ps please see previous post
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  11. #56
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    The End of Acting

    TITANIC and now AVATAR. If I recall correctly, both won major film awards without the actors or actresses involved. With virtual reality on the horizon, like robots and automation, the day of the non-acting movie has become a reality where the best director is a technician whose primary responsiblity is to get all the special effects and computer animated scenes composed with digital lighting and sound. Good-by Jeff Bridges, good-by Meryl Streep, good-by Sandra Bullock, and Robert Downey Jr., you need not apply for future films. The era of inhumanity of movie-making has arrived and I'm not talking aliens.

  12. #57
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    You can't be serious. You sound like a commentator on Fox.
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  13. #58
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    Why Do We Need Actors?

    With the Best Picture Golden Globes AVATAR, my question is "Why do we need real actors?" With animation getting closer and closer to realism, the difference between real actors and animated characters seems to be getting nearer and nearer to zero. If AVATAR can win the hearts and minds of millions and international awards without serious acting and an excellent script than what's next?

  14. #59
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    Quote Originally Posted by tabuno View Post
    With the Best Picture Golden Globes AVATAR, my question is "Why do we need real actors?" With animation getting closer and closer to realism, the difference between real actors and animated characters seems to be getting nearer and nearer to zero. If AVATAR can win the hearts and minds of millions and international awards without serious acting and an excellent script than what's next?
    What's next? Robotic audiences? Oh, forgot...we already have those.

  15. #60
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    Legally Blond

    Quote Originally Posted by Chris Knipp View Post
    What's next? Robotic audiences? Oh, forgot...we already have those.
    There's a scene in the original LEGALLY BLONDE (2001) where there is a class is without any real students and only voice recorders sit on individual student desks and a voice recorder of the teacher's voice sitting on the lecturn while Reese Witherspoon sits by herself looking around.

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