Fuck you Ninjavideo! Fuck you for having this movie available to screen and knowing that I'll have enough free time to watch it while Ben immerses himself in Mafia Wars!
So awful! And I thought it was gonna be kinda a Broken Lizard type thing (and in a really bad way it was) but the difference is that it only made me laugh once as opposed to an average of at least 4 during Beerfest.
Basic premise - 3 guys: first guy likes screwing anything that walks, second guy now hates women after discovering his fiance going down on a white rapper, third guy is the good one of the bunch about to get married.
3 guys venture to go to stripclub...debauchery ensues including a horrifying scene where guy 1 has sex with a midget, then guy 3 cuts guy 1 out of his life (for about a day). Then guy 1 angers a heavyset girl, gets dosed with visine in his drink and insert disgusting poop/diarrhea scene. Guy 1 realizes what a douche he is and then apologizes in this big soliloquy at Guy 3's wedding. Guy 2 is uneventful.
There, if you've read this you've seen the movie. Congrats. I just saved you 1hr and 45 min of your life that I'll never get back again. Fuck me.
Okay, so if you've read anything I've written previously about Avatar you would know that I wasn't especially thrilled to see the movie. In fact, I was all prepared to stream it online (like most things that I don't have complete faith in - like the Men Who Stare at Goats ... I was right about that one by the way). So, with only good intentions I loaded up Ninjavideo and snuggled up to watch Avatar only to squint at blurryness until I fell asleep.
Now, maybe it was because I was tired, or just retardely bored with the first 20 minutes of the movie (okay both) but I realized that streaming it in it's shaky-cam state probably wasn't doing the movie any justice. So, I decided to convince Ben to see it at the theatre.
Theatre fail 1: Got out of the car to witness a lineup out the door. Turned around and went home.
Theatre fail 2: Got out of the car, all the way up to the ticket taker - announcement comes on that both 10pm and 10:50pm shows are sold out...on a FUCKING WEDNESDAY night. Turned around and went home.
It was about time to give up when: enter Christmas Day. Ben and I had already done the family thing on the eve, so why not spend one of the most sacred days at the movies!? YAY!! Got in line to get tickets....got in another line for seats - and finally, my movie experience.
Let me take you through 3 major points of this movie: 1) PRETTY 2) Utter predictability 3) 3D? Seriously?
1) PRETTY
My good god was I right that this movie had to be seen in theatres. I'm all for pirating the shit out of anything I can, I believe that the movie makers make WAY too much money for usually a sub par product, but this movie just couldn't be seen on through an Avatar (2009) Proper - CAM file. I'm not on the bandwagon that says that the animation is groundbreaking, because it really isn't. The Spirits Within was a movie that was groundbreaking in it's time. Now, although the animation is probably some of the best in the business - I wouldn't call it groundbreaking. But fuck is it ever beautiful. There was a movie that I saw not too long ago that I said the same thing - you don't go to see the acting or the story or any of that crap, you just go to go "wow". And I say the same about Avatar. Everything from the neon light-up plants to the crazy alien monster animals made my eyes go a little wider. It was gorgeous. Although I must say that I got a little tired of the colour blue. Why couldn't there be a nice yellow "native" or at least make them black, cause lets face it, everything from the accents to some of the beliefs in nature pretty much made the "savages" straight out of the African mother land.
2) Utter predictability
DO NOT, I REPEAT: DO NOT GO SEE THIS MOVIE IF YOU HAVE SEEN THE FOLLOWING: Ferngully: The Last Rainforest, Delgo, Halo or any Halo related type game movie thing.
I wont even talk about Delgo because I already pointed out the blaring visual similarities here: Ugh, Sometimes Hype Makes Me Sick . I will say though that the story of Delgo and Avatar is completely different BUT that's where Ferngully takes over. Observe:
Ferngully/Avatar: Guy goes to a place (rainforest/pandora), gets transformed (shrunk/Avatar) and can now fit in with the natives (fairies/Na'vi). Rides some trippy creature (dragonfly/Toruk), falls for the hot chick (Crysta/Neytiri), switches sides cause its all about protecting something sacred (beauty of rainforest/pandora) and battles the big bad (Hexxus/Colonel Quaritch). It's seriously the same fucking story. If it wasn't for point #1 then I'd tell you to just go to Blockbuster and rent Ferngully for $2.99 to see the same fucking movie.
If you've seen Halo you've seen the other part of this movie: militarism. That's just about it. Guys running around with guns and authorities that seem like they're on some sort of heavy-duty steroid mix. And while I'm here can I just say that Sigourney Weaver's acting was atrocious? I don't even care if it has nothing to do with point 2 - I was just dying to say it. God, I thought after not acting for how many years, all that acting amazingness was to build up and overflow. Well, just not so. Just not so.
3) 3D? Seriously?
Can I just say that this movie didn't need to be in 3D at all. AT ALL. This is what 3D is to me: SHIT FLYING AT MY FACE! This is what Avatar is to me: NO SHIT FLYING AT MY FACE!
Why is everyone using this medium needlessly? Seriously, if shit isn't flying at your face, don't make it 3D. Just say no. Avatar joins the ranks of the following: Up, Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, Bolt, Superman Returns, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. All of these movies didn't need to be in 3D, and I think that Avatar would have been just as pretty without the fucking huge 3D glasses affixed to my face and making me feel kinda sick. Plus 3D for almost 3 hours is just fucking cruel. CRUEL I say. I don't even wear my own glasses that long in a day. Seriously. Unless some fucking Pandora insects are swooping around my head - leave 3D to the movies MADE for 3D. Like Shrek 4 *shudder*.
All in all I'm sad to say that I'm glad to have seen this movie. If anything it was visually stunning even if it had no actual plot twists, turns, or really anything interesting. You know what would have been better though? If Sam Worthington's character decided to fall in love with Sigourney Weaver's character instead. OR if he fell in love with the male native who hates him. I dont understand why Cameron is getting such praise for this but so be it. Oh, this movie is ALSO like Dances with Wolves. And Pocahontas. Shit I've seen this movie like 18 times already.
Why!? WHY!!?? Why is this happening lord? Since when do we mix our beloved marvel elite with the likes of Cruella de Vil and Pocahontas?
Be prepared to go from this:
To this:
Okay so this image alone is better than Wolverine: Origins (yes, I said it, that movie was redicu-awful), but can you imagine a Wolverine sequel where the guest cameo is Mickey in a wolvie costume? Or perhaps near the end Wolverine sits the x-kids down for a good ol' moral speech about justice and racial equality?
NO. If Wolverine isn't stabbing, smoking, drinking and grunting, then its just not a movie I want to see.
In fact, be prepared for all the marvel titles to tote a nice friendly PG rating from here on in. Or maybe they'll get crazy and do a PG-13 on us like Curse of the Black Pearl.
Disney Studios has aquired Stan Lee's brain child hoping to corner a new market:
“It helps Disney add exposure to a young male demographic it had sort of lost some balance with,” Joyce said, noting the $4-billion offer was at “full price.”
What? Disney Princesses weren't enough for you? Hell! It only took you 70 years to come out with an African American one! Disney...you're so progressive.
Here's hoping they cast Miley Cyrus as Shadowcat. OH PLEASE OH PLEASE OH PLEASE!
Is anyone else really tired of hearing about James Cameron's Avatar? What's happening out in the Hollywood scene with this one is even worse than the propaganda around the last Spiderman movie. So they show a 60sec preview of this "game changing" movie and the tickets sell out in something like a 1.33 seconds, crashing the internet and people are fighting over them like mad. Its 60 seconds people! 60 seconds that are bound to be on youtube within an hour of the preview airing in theaters. Crazies. Its a fucking movie by the guy who did Titanic. TITANIC. Why did everyone love that movie but me???
So anyway, I was taking a look at Avatar, not to be confused with the only Avatar worth seeing but unfortunately being directed by M.Night Sha-shittydirector-malan, and thought it looked strangely familiar. Now I'm not naive enough to believe that anything coming out of the Hollywood machine is even remotely original anymore, but I did have some high hopes for this one. In my internet searching, turns out I was right.
Apparently Avatar looks pretty similar to some other movies out there right now. Particularly one called Delgo.
Delgo was a shitty animated film last year that completely bombed at the box office. The plot centered around a teenage alien trying to rally the troops to save the world from itself or some junk.
Anyway, take a look at these very interesting side by side comparisons:
1) Floating rocks.
Hmm...how to make a creepy sci-fi world... mist: check. rock formations: check. I think we're done guys!
Okay so I know a lot of movies has the same scenery so really my argument so far is weak. So, let me just comment on how if you think this is cool - picture it on a black t-shirt with a wolf howling in front of it being worn by a 40-something year old man who refuses to take off his leather jacket in 30degree weather. Yea. Not so cool now is it?
2) Litebrite action! Why do so many animated sci-fi's have this very scene in it?? I swear this was also in Ferngully. Anyway, maybe these movies just aren't complete
without the scene that comes in the middle where the lead male character has a reflective moment with the lead female character where they ponder their existence and the fate of the world. So deep man. I'm already writing fan fiction about the sexual tension there. Its so uncomfortable!
Side note: Delgo - if you want your 2008 movie to do well you don't put your female lead in pink spandex, just sayin'.
3) Scary Monsters!
Oh c'mon. It's the same movie. Look at that! In fact its also the same movie as the 4th Harry Potter. Only not as cool, and with less sexy wizards. Those Weasley twins are sexy sexy bitches. But I digress.
Okay imagine these in the same colour palate. They're practically twin dragons. 5 bucks says that in each movie's next scenes the aliens try to befriend and then mount the dragons backs to ride them against the enemy.
4) I so won that bet.
Pay me my money bitches!
5) Aww. Alien love.
I win. Avatar is Delgo.
So I pose this question - if Avatar is so extremely unoriginal, then why rip off a movie as bad as Delgo? Perhaps they thought it would be missed? But clearly it wasn't and now its just kinda pathetic.
Seriously Cameron, your follow-up to Titanic is a re-imagined Delgo? For shame.
And even if it was all coincidence, someone please tell me what is so "game" or "life" changing about this movie? I thought when I watched the trailer that I would feel the sort of shock and awe that I felt when I first saw the trailer for Final Fantasy: the Spirits Within. The kind of shock when you see ground breaking animation for the first time in large scale and just go: WOW. And I just don't feel it with this one. It was more like an: oh, alright.
You wanna get me exited? Show me something to get excited about and not the same old animation style we've been seeing ever since Weta got their hands on LOTR. Also, I'm pretty over this whole 3D phase we have going on lately with every movie that seems to be coming out. You know what we need? 4D viewing. Cameron - bring me some smell-o-vision from some exotic alien world (although I imagine that one would smell like lavender washed socks rolled in blue cheese) and maybe then I'll agree that your movie is "game changing", but until then you're just Delgo: the sequel in 3D to me.
Edit: Thanks to Kim for sending me this and proving that Hitler couldn't have been all that bad
I'm a whole lotta awesome built into an equally awesome package. And for this - you will listen to every word I have to say!! Me in a nutshell: My new baby, TV, comics, husband, nails, good times (not necessarily in that order)
Big HI to everyone who stumbles across this page, and a WHOOT to those who decide to stick around for all my random musings. Welcome!
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