Avatar (2009)
SUMMARIES
When his brother is killed in a robbery, paraplegic Marine Jake Sully decides to take his place in a mission on the distant world of Pandora. There he learns of greedy corporate figurehead Parker Selfridge's intentions of driving off the native humanoid "Na'vi" in order to mine for the precious material scattered throughout their rich woodland. In exchange for the spinal surgery that will fix his legs, Jake gathers intel for the cooperating military unit spearheaded by gung-ho Colonel Quaritch, while simultaneously attempting to infiltrate the Na'vi people with the use of an "avatar" identity. While Jake begins to bond with the native tribe and quickly falls in love with the beautiful alien Neytiri, the restless Colonel moves forward with his ruthless extermination tactics, forcing the soldier to take a stand - and fight back in an epic battle for the fate of Pandora.
REVIEW
"With 'Avatar' James Cameron has turned one man's dream of the movies into a trippy joy ride about the end of life - our moviegoing life included - as we know it. Several decades in the dreaming and more than four years in the actual making, the movie is a song to the natural world that was largely produced with software, an Emersonian exploration of the invisible world of the spirit filled with Cameronian rock'em, sock'em pulpy action. Created to conquer hearts, minds, history books and box-office records, the movie - one of the most expensive in history, the jungle drums thump - is glorious and goofy and blissfully deranged.
In my opinion, Avatar has been hyped beyond the point of forgiveness.
The "sky people," who are Earth whites escaping from a destroyed earth perhaps due to climate change, land on the far-away moon of Pandora to dig for the mineral, unobtainium. To do so, they have to demolish huge trees similar to Sequoias which unlike Sequoias have an extraordinary ability through their roots to contact one another. Most important, the trees are sacred to the indigenous people known as the Na'vi. The Na'vi appear to be human but are constructed differently in face and color (blue) and have lion-like tails.
The movie quickly turns into a Cowboy vs. Indian type of picture. In the year 2154, when this encounter takes place, the whites have huge war machines with which to attack the Na'vi. The Na'vi are assisted in their battle by dinosaur-like creatures some of which fly and are used as airplanes on which they ride. The Na'vi, of course, are wonderful people while the whites, I mean the fly people, are vicious.