“Avatar: The Way of Water” harkens back to a time when Hollywood bigshots thought, “If a picture is worth a thousand words, a 3D picture is worth a million words.” The original film, 2009’s “Avatar” was director James Cameron’s grand experiment in the audience’s tolerance for 2 hours 42 minutes of images popping off the screen.
Thirteen years ago, the million words theory worked. “Avatar” was a massive hit, grossing almost 3 billion dollars worldwide, as rumors of a series of sequels hung in the air. Delay after delay kept the blue people off screens for so long, four presidents came and went while Cameron tinkered with the story and the technology to bring his vision to life.
The tinkering is finally over. Cameron returns to theatres with the first of four planned sequels, “Avatar: The Way of Water,” an epic 3D sequel that mixes astonishing visuals with eye-rolling teenagers, a character with the b-movie name Z-Dog and a 3 hour and 12-minute tale of colonialism.
Set on Pandora, an Earth-like habitable extrasolar moon from the Alpha Centauri System populated by the Na’vi, the 9 to 10 feet tall Indigenous peoples, the movie picks up the action more than a decade after the events of the first film. Former Marine Jake Sully (Sam Worthington), who left his human body behind to permanently become Na’vi, lives on the peaceful planet with wife Neytiri (Zoe Saldaña) and children.
Their idyll is interrupted with the return of the Sky People, humans who want to“pacify the hostiles” and takeover Pandora.
“Earth is dying,” says General Frances Ardmore (Edie Falco). “Pandora is the new frontier.”
Despite having been killed off in the original, the Pandora-bound team is led by the ruthless Colonel Miles Quaritch (Stephen Lang), a genetically engineered “recombinant” or avatar version of the late Marine, implanted with his mind and emotions. “We have been brought back in the form of our enemy,” he says of he and his team. He plans on taking Pandora at any cost, and getting revenge on Sully, who he sees as a traitor.
Forced into hiding with Tonowari (Cliff Curtis), Ronal (Kate Winslet) and the reef people clan of Metkayina, Sully and his family learn the way of water—”no beginning and no end”—and fight to defend their world.
So, the big question is: Was “Avatar: The Way of Water” worth the wait?
As a technical achievement, yes, unquestionably. The visuals are stunning, particularly in the underwater scenes. Cameron’s camera has a nimbleness often missing in 3D films, which often feel locked-down. His fluid camera roams, on land and sea, capturing some of the most eye-popping, breathtaking scenes of this, or any other, season. Each and every frame is carefully considered, and most could be cut out, framed and hung on the wall to great effect.
The visuals facilitate Cameron’s world building, providing tantalizing views of the forest land of Pandora and the wet ‘n wild world of Metkayina, complete with giant whale-like creatures that could have sprung from the imagination of Ray Harryhausen, and lush, colorful flora and fauna.
It does not look like any other 3D film—even the original “Avatar”—and will engage the eye and stimulate the brain.
Unfortunately, the same cannot be said about the story, which is as simple as the images are complex. Essentially, Cameron continues the colonialization themes of the first film, while adding in mysticism, traditional medicine, poachers and even a nod to Jonah and the Whale.
Most of all, it is a story of family, of parents and children. Apparently, Pandorian kids behave sort of like Earth teens, eye rolls, attitude and all. The family relationships add an intimate element to the epic story, but the visuals often get in the way of the storytelling.
Long action sequences, like a spectacular sea creature attack, take away from the movie’s main thrust, pushing the running time upwards, but not advancing the story. Perhaps they are scheduled in to accommodate bathroom breaks. Whatever the reason, they showcase Cameron’s mastery of the form but often feel spectacular simply for the sake of spectacle.
Loud and proud, “Avatar: The Way of Water” can be, by times, overwhelming, but it’s also the kind of grand scale movie that demands to be seen on the biggest, most immersive screen possible. Cameron shoots for the moon, but goes even further, to a place called Pandora.
A new feature from from ctvnews.ca! The Crouse Review is a quick, hot take on the weekend’s biggest movies! This week Richard looks at “Wonder Woman” with Gal Gadot, Kevin Hart in the animated “Captain Underpants: the First Epic Movie” and “Drone,” staring Sean Bean.
Richard and CP24 anchor Nathan Downer have a look at the weekend’s new movies, “Wonder Woman” with Gal Gadot, Kevin Hart in the animated “Captain Underpants: the First Epic Movie” and “Drone,” staring Sean Bean.
Richard sits in with CTV NewsChannel anchor Erin Paul to discuss whether “Wonder Woman” is all that wonderful, if “Captain Underpants: the First Epic Movie” is crappy or not and if “Drone” lives up to its name.
“Drone,” the new film from Vancouver director Jason Bourque, approaches the subject of drone warfare from a personal point of view. Unlike “Eye in the Sky,” a thriller that examined the legal, military, moral and political ramifications of an unmanned aerial vehicle bombing on high value targets in the war on terror, “Drone” places the story in a smaller world, the territory of a suburban private military contractors.
Neil (Sean Bean) is a family man, a concerned father who tenderly touches his troubled son’s shoulder with an offer to talk, “anytime you like.” His biggest worry is how to summarize his late father’s life into a eulogy. “It’s harder than I thought,” he says.
Like millions of others he’s a suburban husband who commutes to work to spend the day sitting in front of a computer. Unlike millions of others, from nine to five he rains down holy hell on unsuspecting enemies, dropping bombs from remote controlled drones.
It’s a good, safe office job until a hack reveals the names of many private drone operators, including Neil. The trouble he has been so careful to insulate himself and his family from becomes up close and personal when Karachi businessman Imir (Patrick Sabongui), convinced Neil is responsible for the deaths of his wife and child, comes to visit on the anniversary of their passing.
“In this videogame the victims are real,” Imir says. “They come home to their families after a long day of murder and put their children to bed. It’s easy to divorce what they do from real life consequences.”
“Drone” is an appropriate name for a movie that drones on at a glacial pace for much of its running time. The slow burn establishes Neil’s family dynamic, his grief over the loss of his father and the moments leading up to Imir’s revelation that his wife and child were “struck by a missile.” Using off kilter camera angles and low key, deliberate dialogue Bourque builds tension as Imir answers questions from Neil’s wife and son, both of whom are unaware of what dad does for a living.
Despite Bourque’s stylistic flourishes “Drone” is a psychological drama that, save for a hint of activity in its final moments, feels like it could have worked just as well as a stage play. Dialogue heavy, its all bark and very little bite leading up to an ending that is meant to be profound but overplays its hand. A twist here, a turn there and we’re left with a conclusion that adds little new to the conversation on the ethics of drone warfare.
Hilly Kristal became known as the Grand Curator of Punk. As the owner of CBGB, the American birthplace of punk rock, he auditioned hundreds of bands and gave groups like The Ramones, Blondie and The Talking Heads their first big breaks. When he liked a band he’d say his now legendary catchphrase, “There’s something there…”
After watching “CBGB,” the Alan Rickman movie based on his life and club, I was reminded of Gertrude Stein’s famous catchphrase, “There is no there there.”
When we first met Hilly (Rickman) he’s a divorced father with two failed clubs to his credit. When he stumbles across a dive bar on New York City’s Bowery he sees an opportunity. Taking over the lease, he befriends the neighborhood’s junkies, bikers and musicians, even if his original idea of presenting country, blue grass and blues (hence the acronym CBGB) gets passed over in favor of underground music by bands like Television and The Ramones.
The club is a hit, but Kristal is a terrible businessman who never pays his rent or liquor distributors. That job falls to his daughter Lisa (“Twilight’s” Ashley Greene) who pays the bills as an endless parade of musicians with names like Iggy Pop (Taylor Hawkins), Joey Ramone (Joel David Moore), Cheetah Chrome (Rupert Grint) and Debbie Harry (Malin Akerman) create a new youth movement on the club’s rickety stage.
Punk rock was a glorious racket, a stripped-down music designed put a bullet in the head of the Flower Power generation. Loud, fast and snotty, the music was ripe with energy and rebellion.
In other words it was everything that “CBGB” is not.
Director Randall Miller gets period details mostly right—the film’s set features artifacts from the punk rock shrine, including the bar, the pay phone, the poster filled walls and the infamously funky toilets—but entirely misses the spirit of the times and the music.
A movie about punk rock should crackle with energy. Despite a rockin’ soundtrack, “CBGB” feels inert. The story focuses on Kristal but Rickman barely registers. The actor reduces the flamboyant character to a morose monotone; a man at the center of a hurricane but who doesn’t feel the breeze.
The impersonations of the musicians are mostly quite good. The surprising stand-out is Rupert Grint as Dead Boys bassist Cheetah Chrome. It’s as un-Harry Potter a performance as you could imagine and he enthusiastically embraces Daniel Radcliffe’s post-Potter habit of showing his bum as often as possible.
Others acquit themselves in suitable snotty fashion, but the recreations mostly made me wish “CBGB” was a documentary and not a feature film. It has interesting tidbits about the time. For instance when Hilly first meets the Ramones he asks if they have any original songs. They say they only have five tunes, four of which have “I Don’t Wanna” in the title while the fifth is called “I Wanna Sniff Some Glue.” It’s a funny story, whether true or not, it hints at the kind of details that may have fleshed out a film that spends far too much time focused on the club and not on the music.
Not that there is a shortage of music, but it feels more “Rock of Ages” than “Raw Power.”
“CBGB” takes an exciting story of an important time and shaves all the rough edges away, leaving behind smoothed over vision of a rough-and-ready time.
“Avatar: The Way of Water” harkens back to a time when Hollywood bigshots thought, “If a picture is worth a thousand words, a 3D picture is worth a million words.” The original film, 2009’s “Avatar” was director James Cameron’s grand experiment in the audience’s tolerance for 2 hours 42 minutes of images popping off the screen.
