In a world of greed, one man would come along and free the people of 'Pandora' from the tyranny of the humans; That man is the Avatar.

If I had wrote the voice over to advertise this movie, the words above would have been used.

This movie tells us of the story of Pandora, a lush moon in Alpha Centauri.  The humans have gone there to mine a material called unobtanium.  The film never explains why this material is of such importance but my guess would be that it's a Mcguffin.  (a plot device)

 Jake Sully has been sent to Pandora to take the place of his brother, who has died and becomes an avatar.  He's sent to mingle with the people of the planet, called the Na'vi, who are ten foot tall.  As he learns the ways of the Na'vi and begins to see that his fellow humans are bad for the planet.  He eventually joins them in their fight against the tyranny called man.

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The plot isn't complicated to follow and reminds me of movies that have been released in China/Hong Kong.  I would suspect that if someone was to study the art of kungfu, they would automatically see similarities to the way the Na'vi respected nature and they way that a kungfu expert controls the Qui. (pronounced chi)  The people have learnt to live with nature and it reminded me of the native Americans of the past, or the elves of Lord of the Rings.  They seemed to understand the circle of life and showed it respect, and nature as a whole.  I could see what James Cameron was trying to do with this film and I would say that he succeeded in his task.

The world is rich and visceral.  When Jake Sully was flying on his bird, it felt real and made me feel jealous.  I would have loved to have experienced what it would have felt like to fly one of these creatures. 

The only complaint I would have with the film is that it did feel slow for the first hour or so.  Perhaps the fact that this movie will probably be the first in a new franchise, explains the need to cover the back-story so deep.  It didn't explain why the humans had gone to Alpha Centauri or why this material called unobtanium was so important; I would suspect that the inevitable sequel will develop the plot a little more.

As a whole, the film was enjoyable to watch and even though I have heard the film being referred to as "smurf-o-hontus," it did exactly what I was expecting from a James Cameron movie.  There was lots of explosions, a moral story and the usual good wins over bad.  If you can overlook the obvious clichés, you will enjoy this movie too.

 

I suspect that the planet Pandora is an allusion to 'Pandora's box,' which is a story of a girl who finds Pandora's box and opens it.  As the box is opened, all the evil creatures of the world are let out.  The similarity would be that going to the planet Pandora would have a similar effect. It is a simple plot device but one that works well.