Movie Review: Avatar (on Blu-ray)

Staring: Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Sigourney Weaver, Stephen Lang, Joel David Moore, Michelle Rodriguez
Rated PG-13

I happily proclaim that I did not see Avatar at the theater. So, out of sheer morbid curiosity and constant harassment by my friends, I rented Avatar on Blu-ray. I think my husband summed the movie up nicely with three simple words: LIVE-ACTION FURNGULLY.

The visuals and special effects of this movie kick-ass, and the Blu-ray definitely improves it. The only drawback is that there are parts of the CGI that end up looking extremely fake due to the colors being so
enhanced. In a lot of parts you can see the transitions from the regular shot to CGI. I saw the same thing in the trailers where they were aired on TV, but it was no where near as noticeable. Then again, I do a lot of photo manipulation and dabble in video editing, so that kind of stuff stands out to me way more than the average person.

The story line was simply lame. It's been done a zillion time. As mentioned above: FurnGully rip off. I had hoped for something a lot more original, but it's obvious they skimped on the writing in order to throw more money into the special effects.

Overall, the movie was impressive, but I didn't enjoy it anywhere near as much as I thought I would. In fact, I don't think I would have been able to sit through the whole thing at the theater. I ended up watching it over the course of two nights mainly because it took well over an hour for the action to pick up, and even then it was just barely enough to keep me interested.

On a side note, the movie needed more of Joel David Moore. I love him on Bones.


Rating 3 stars (on account of the sepcial effects)