As usual when I write about films, spoilers abound so you might want to hold off on reading this until after you’ve watched it yourself. However, the plot is so cliche-ridden and so predictable that it’s pretty hard to spoil the film. It’s basically Dances with Wolves in space and all the pertinent plot points are clearly telegraphed from the first moment that you see the planet Pandora. Having only recently rewatched Aliens, I was also struck by how many themes and ideas were re-used. Over the top gung-ho soldier? Check. Greedy corporation exec who cares only about the bottom line? Check. Even the military vehicles and mechs look vaguely familiar.
The wonder of the film is that it all works, which says a lot about James Cameron’s directing skills. The film is genuinely breathtaking and spectacular, so much so that when you see it for the first time you simply know that this is something that you have never seen before. In that sense, it’s every bit as iconic and singular an experience as watching Star Wars or Jurassic Park for the very first time. It’s the same kind of once-in-a-lifetime experience that just blows you away.
It’s when you walk out of the cinema that all of the plot holes and flaws catch up with you. How do the human controllers connect with the avatar bodies? It must be magic because it seems to be unaffected by range or electromagnetic interference and the avatar bodies don’t seem to come with electronics. Why was the human ground force fooling around in the jungle for when the mission was to bomb the Tree of Souls? How ludicrous is it that no animals come to eat the avatar bodies when the human controllers are disconnected, especially after the film has established how hostile the jungle is? How come if the rocks float, the water still falls from it? And if they are made of the magical anti-gravity mineral, why don’t the humans just tow those away instead of trying to mine it from underground?
It’s common knowledge that Cameron wrote the original script for Avatar not long after he finished Titanic, so the script is still floating around the Internet. This website has a good comparison of the differences between the original scriptment and the film that ended up being made. It’s apparent that the original script was more subtle and less filled with cliches but a great deal more bloated. For example, in the original script the Na’vi that Jake falls in love with isn’t the first one that he meets, the research team is being helped by a Na’vi guide and Grace is secretly sleeping with him, there’s a previous human controller who fell in love with a Na’vi girl but she was killed by the military and he committed suicide etc. It all makes the Jake character less unique and less like a superhero who came out of nowhere to save the world.
For all these reasons, while watching Avatar once is practically mandatory, I doubt that the film stands up to repeated viewings. Even the technology will eventually look dated. But for now, it’s undoubtedly one of the most beautiful things ever put on film.