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Old 2009-12-31, 14:28   Link #121
5yewy5r
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Just watched it the other night at Imax, in 3D. The visuals were breathtaking. They were really good. When it first sorta glided you through the trees I got that downhill roller coaster feeling. It took me awhile to settle in because we sat too far forward, but once I did I was immersed. I couldn't tell if the avatars were actors heavily modified with CG and make up, or if they were entirely CG. Can anyone clarify?

The plot isn't very good though. I didn't really like any of the characters (except the colonel, but that's probably because he's the closest thing to something badass in the movie. Maybe I'm just a retard that way), they were pretty standard archetypes. (including the colonel >_>)

Spoiler for spoilers:
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Old 2009-12-31, 21:36   Link #122
Samari
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It was decent. Saw it in theaters in 3D. But I think people are overrating how epic it was. The visuals were impressive, but the story was a familiar one...most notably in Dances with Wolves and then The Last Samurai. If I could break down the film in a few words I would label it as Final Fantasy meets Dances with Wolves. Still worth the money none-the-less. I don't see myself adding it to my favorites collection when it comes out for home release though.
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Old 2009-12-31, 22:59   Link #123
GreatTeacherKen
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I thought the movie was okay. The special effects and James Horner's score are amazing, and I'm a major scenery porn lover so I liked all the focus on Pandora's environment. But as cool and imaginative as the whole world of Pandora is, I found the story hard to get emotionally involved in since most of the characters, except for Dr. Grace and Colonel Miles Quattrich, seem so flat to me.

I do have to commend Cameron for managing to make Quattrich quite threatening during the final battle even though he's probably physically weaker than Jake at that point.
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Old 2010-01-01, 00:12   Link #124
Vexx
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Quote:
Originally Posted by james0246 View Post
American? That is just one of dozens (plus) countries/nationalities that have committed such atrocities in the history of mankind (the US isn't even the most recent). If any "shame" is supposed to be had, it is not for a specific nationality, but rather for all mankind...
Aye.. you could just as easily map the Roman Empire expansion over the Kelt and Germanic tribes of Northern Europe... or the British romps into the Asian/Indian regions. Or Conquistadors in the early Americas... (or the Aztecs versus their surrounding lesser nations).

Elements of mankind seems infected with this "rape, pillage, extract" disease that ruin a good day for the other 80% of the population (whether they're minions for these psychopaths or the ones in the way).

I enjoyed the film quite a lot... but that's recognizing the basic "Fern Gully Dances with Wolves" underpinning. I've meet real Quattrich types and real "corporate bozo" types so even those characters aren't so "over-the-top" as some might think. All the character development, however, did suffer from the "no time, too much to see" problem so they're left somewhat sketchy.

The Dr. Grace subplot and getting her wish wasn't that cheesy... though it did telegraph Jake's end solution so thoroughly a doorstop would get it... so it goes.

I liked the little chopper pilot -- reminded me of a KC-135 pilot and a search&rescue Blackhawk H-60 pilot I worked with.... they both looked quite cute in their flightsuits and were gumchewing smartasses
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Old 2010-01-01, 06:35   Link #125
felix
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I am hearing this movie wasn't that successful...
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Old 2010-01-01, 07:16   Link #126
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T'was a good movie, better than most crap Hollywood's putting out these days. And it was very pretty, love those trees!
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Old 2010-01-01, 08:02   Link #127
Nosauz
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Cats View Post
I am hearing this movie wasn't that successful...
it made back it's 500 million budget opening week, it's successful. Most hollywood movies range from low 50s to 120 for action films, the monster budget, I bet the studio was hoping to break even, but gudging by the publics reaction to the movie this will be seen as a success. Also not to mention most movies lose money while this one even with a large budget has started making money.
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Old 2010-01-01, 08:20   Link #128
Roger Rambo
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Cats View Post
I am hearing this movie wasn't that successful...
You're hearing things from trolls then. Avatar has in less than two weeks and made more than three quarters of a billion dollars.

Avatar's
Most movies that are "successful" typically get revenue drops of up to 60% on their 2nd weekend. Avatar's revenue dropped 1.8%

Also, the weekday releases of Avatar 2nd week of release have actually seen it making more money than it did it's first week of release.


Post 1st week of release, the idea that Avatar was going to bomb was just trolling perpetuated by butt hurt people on /tv/ who had invested many troll points in predicting Avatar would fail. That's why that one day when that new Alvin movie got released where it made a few million more than Avatar did, everyone got on the troll car to harp about Avatar failing.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Nosauz View Post
it made back it's 500 million budget opening week, it's successful.
Avatar did not have a 500 million dollar budget.

It had a 237 million dollar production budget with 150 million dollars allocated to marketing. Combined that's only 15% more expensive than the Dark Knight.
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Old 2010-01-01, 08:26   Link #129
Nosauz
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Roger Rambo View Post
Avatar did not have a 500 million dollar budget.

It had a 237 million dollar production budget with 150 million dollars allocated to marketing. Combined that's only 15% more expensive than the Dark Knight.
I was scanning variety/digg/tmz so I didn't really get into the details of the movie because at the time I was not planning to see it. Still production + advertising campaigns are still considered the actual budget, and that means it was basically a 400 million dollar project. Anyway the movie is very profitable even at the 500 million budget mark so this cements it. Expect to see more 3D movies in the future.
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Old 2010-01-01, 08:27   Link #130
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Roger Rambo View Post
You're hearing things from trolls then. Avatar has in less than two weeks and made more than three quarters of a billion dollars.

Avatar's
Most movies that are "successful" typically get revenue drops of up to 60% on their 2nd weekend. Avatar's revenue dropped 1.8%

Also, the weekday releases of Avatar 2nd week of release have actually seen it making more money than it did it's first week of release.

Avatar did not have a 500 million dollar budget.

It had a 237 million dollar production budget with 150 million dollars allocated to marketing. Combined that's only 15% more expensive than the Dark Knight.
Oh good someone who knows their shit. I like your avatar btw.
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Old 2010-01-01, 09:49   Link #131
-KarumA-
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Quote:
Originally Posted by 5yewy5r View Post
I couldn't tell if the avatars were actors heavily modified with CG and make up, or if they were entirely CG. Can anyone clarify?
The facial features are based on actors, by that meaning facial features. I found a site to explain it all, it's quite interesting cause they used a new system for the muscles etc. in the models

http://www.techradar.com/news/video/...-avatar-658031
Quote:
Lemmon adds, "We used a lot of photographs and scans of the actors and tried to incorporate the details of the physical actors into the digital characters – for both the Na'vi and humans. There are some characters like Jake, who's played by Sam Worthington, where there's both an Avatar double and a digital double.

"There's a lot of data that we captured through digital scanning and Lightstage capture. In addition, we did a lot of extra texture and shader work to make sure all that detail went into the final renders."

A new muscle system

For animating the digital characters in Avatar, Weta Digital had to develop some key technologies that would simulate realism as accurately as possible. Previously, Weta used relatively simplified muscle-simulation systems to generalise how muscles deformed a character's skin.

With Avatar, CG supervisor Simon Clutterbuck led the team to create a more accurate skeletal and muscle-simulation system. "It's quite cool now. Muscles intercollide, preserve their volume and are anatomically correct," says Lemmon.

"There are tissue layers, tendon sheets and all the critical parts of how a muscle system works. It gives a much more realistic starting point for creating believable creature deformations such as all the sliding under the skin and the dynamics of flesh as it moves."
For the Na'vi to be believable, realistic facial animation was crucial. The Na'vi experience a wide range of emotions and the facial animation had to convey these in a realistic way, or potentially fall into the 'Uncanny Valley.'

Weta used a variety of techniques to get the facial animation to a realistic state. First of all was facial motion capture. Using a high-definition video camera attached to the face of an actor and markers on the face, Weta's in-house software was able to map out which muscles in the face were firing.

The underlying technology is based on Paul Eckman and Wallace Friesen's Facial Action Coding System (FACS). By creating a map of muscle firings, Weta was able to retarget the motion data onto faces that don't match directly – in this instance, the Na'vi.

"We started doing this when we were working on King Kong," says Lemmon. "Andy Serkis was playing Kong and his facial anatomy is fairly different from a gorilla's. By capturing the muscle firings, we were able to retarget the motions back onto an animal with different anatomy and topology. We were looking to do essentially the same thing with the Na'vi but in a more sophisticated way."

"This system allowed us to generate a lot of detail in the motion of the faces," Jones adds. "Jim shot a ton of HD reference of his actors and that ended up being the saving grace for the animation process. Once the facial solve came out of motion capture, we would submit side-by-side renders of the real actor and his avatar/Na'vi counterpart, and tweak and adjust the facial animation to get every last nuance into the performance."

Advanced facial rigs

In order to create and retain the detail in the faces, Weta upped the ante in facial rig complexity and mesh resolution. "The facial rigs are by far the most advanced I have ever worked with," proclaims Jones.
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Old 2010-01-01, 12:29   Link #132
Roger Rambo
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Originally Posted by Nostalgia View Post
Oh good someone who knows their shit. I like your avatar btw.
Thanks.

Though I find your second compliment ironic given the thread.
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Old 2010-01-01, 13:16   Link #133
Wargumm1i
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Still what I found so true in the movie is the corruptness in humans. I mean Avatar was a geniune display on how corrupt and greedy, war-hungry, humans are. And I do admit that the whole Jake falling in love with the Navi native, was a bit and the whole "love-scene" where they did the bad thing lol, was like.
Spoiler:


It display a beautiful story line on how people who have lost all hope(Jake), manages too find hope in life(Navi).

But still I really am curious how the sequals will carry on the story... if there will be one.

I mean the movie ended perfectly, Jake got his wish and got too be with Navi girl, and who knows perhaps now he is the leader of the Tribe etc etc. And the Humans who left the earth are now on a long 5 years trip too Earth. So if there is a sequal I doubt it will have Humans as enemys.
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Old 2010-01-01, 13:33   Link #134
james0246
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^From various interviews, Cameron has expressed interest in producing novels that explore life on not only the Na'vi's world, but other moons orbiting the gas giant in the sky.

His next movie, though, is Battle Angel Alita...then again, this has been his next movie since 2000 or so.
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Old 2010-01-01, 16:30   Link #135
karthak
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http://news.mongabay.com/2009/1222-hance_avatar.html

A rather depressing article about how companies in the real world are doing things AT LEAST as bad as in the film to indigenous peoples around the world. Said people also have the disadvantage that unlike the Na'vi they aren't three meters tall, hideously strong, and can call upon mighty animals to fight beside them, so they don't even have the option of driving out the f@%Īkers who rape their lands with force.
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Old 2010-01-01, 17:13   Link #136
Nosauz
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Originally Posted by karthak View Post
http://news.mongabay.com/2009/1222-hance_avatar.html

A rather depressing article about how companies in the real world are doing things AT LEAST as bad as in the film to indigenous peoples around the world. Said people also have the disadvantage that unlike the Na'vi they aren't three meters tall, hideously strong, and can call upon mighty animals to fight beside them, so they don't even have the option of driving out the f@%Īkers who rape their lands with force.
East India Trading Company, Enough said, this isn't new this is happening now in the modern world, it happened in the world before now, nothing new nothing different. Some humans are willing to sacrifice their humanity for profit and others just allow it to go on as long as their needs have been met. The worst part of all of this is the apathy.
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Old 2010-01-01, 17:15   Link #137
Vexx
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You could probably provide hundreds of such links and documentation... until the large extractive corporations and their executives are made responsible for their actions - it is unlikely to change.
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Old 2010-01-02, 09:08   Link #138
Roger Rambo
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Originally Posted by karthak View Post
http://news.mongabay.com/2009/1222-hance_avatar.html

A rather depressing article about how companies in the real world are doing things AT LEAST as bad as in the film to indigenous peoples around the world. Said people also have the disadvantage that unlike the Na'vi they aren't three meters tall, hideously strong, and can call upon mighty animals to fight beside them, so they don't even have the option of driving out the f@%Īkers who rape their lands with force.
It's stuff like this which makes me roll my eye's at people who found the corporations actions "unrealistic".
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Old 2010-01-02, 10:00   Link #139
karthak
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It's stuff like this which makes me roll my eye's at people who found the corporations actions "unrealistic".
Another criticism of the film actually made me anticipate it more. When people were saying that it was just dances with wolves and ferngully IN SPACE, my reaction was: oh yea! Now I want to see it even more!

Why? Because Ferngully was one of my favorite animated movies when I was a child, and I read that dances with wolves got 7 oscars, including best picture, and that the Sioux Nation liked it so much they even adopted Costner as an honorary member. Bit funny that negative remarks about the movie just made me more interested.
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Old 2010-01-02, 12:00   Link #140
ChainLegacy
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True that, as others have said originality is nice but not required. I thought this movie did a good job of combining and re-using old themes and plot elements. I mean, like you said, we might have already seen Dances With Wolves, but not the space version! So in that sense Avatar still brought something new to the table by combining these elements in a meaningful fashion.
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