Neytiri, Jake, and family are back fighting against the human invaders. One kid feels guilty over his brother’s death in the previous movie. One has an existential crisis about her connection to Eywa. The youngest is just there. Spider (the human kid living with them) has battery power mask issues. Quaritch and Jake find themselves momentary allies trying to save Spider before Quaritch aligns himself with the fire people and takes military control back from the woman in charge. And there’s that whole whale killing plot so they can make a billion dollars.
I feel the same about this installation as I did about The Way of Water. Visually, it’s stunning. A watchable spectacle that’s hard to turn away from. Pandora will never not look that way.
The real high point here is Oona Chaplin (Rob Stark’s wife in Game of Thrones) as Varang, the witchy chief of the fire tribe whose forest was destroyed by a volcano. Her performance is on par with Zoe Saldana’s Neytiri in the first film. She breathes much needed life into this film. A breath of fresh air. Would I have loved to see the film be about her finding her way back to Eywa instead of rehashing the previous movie? Yep. But, I’ll take what we got here because she’s the highpoint for me.
I also enjoy watching Kiri whose connection with Eywa gets explored again, which leads to some great scenes. I think the point here is that the female characters are far more interesting than the male. Not sure why. Their dialogue isn’t as cheesy – they don’t call each other bro – and they tend to add more substance.
Speaking of James Cameron’s bad dialogue writing skills – I honestly believe that he’s just trolling us for all our complaints. He actually throws in a ‘pinky swear’ and Stephen Lang’s delivery suggests he’s in on the joke. Cameron has made some of the most memorable movies ever. Perhaps the cheesy dialogue is part of their charm. What would Titanic be without I’m King of the World? Aliens without Stay away from her, you bitch? Avatar without Not in this economy? The lines add some unintentional humor, that’s for sure. Perhaps Cameron could employ an editor? Give us dialogue that matches Pandora in a distant future, not 2025 Earth. Le sigh.
If you loved the first two, you’ll love this. It’s better than The Way of Water, but falls short of the first film. Too many characters following too many plot points to get emotionally invested in as much. The environmental and religious themes are all still there, front and center, convoluting the plot the wants to revolve around guns and military jargon. But maybe who cares? It’s still a masterclass in the CGI spectacle that Cameron spent two decades perfecting. With a better story, maybe it wouldn’t have felt like 3 hours. One Battle After Another proved that a great story with cool cinematography makes a long movie fly by quickly. Cameron could learn a thing or two from that.
3 out of 5 stars. Would have been 4 or 5 if Varang was the main character.
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Becky Tyler Art and Photography 
Neytiri, Jake, and family are back fighting against the human invaders. One kid feels guilty over his brother’s death in the previous movie. One has an existential crisis about her connection to Eywa. The youngest is just there. Spider (the human kid living with them) has battery power mask issues. Quaritch and Jake find themselves momentary allies trying to save Spider before Quaritch aligns himself with the fire people and takes military control back from the woman in charge. And there’s that whole whale killing plot so they can make a billion dollars.
I feel the same about this installation as I did about The Way of Water. Visually, it’s stunning. A watchable spectacle that’s hard to turn away from. Pandora will never not look that way.
The real high point here is Oona Chaplin (Rob Stark’s wife in Game of Thrones) as Varang, the witchy chief of the fire tribe whose forest was destroyed by a volcano. Her performance is on par with Zoe Saldana’s Neytiri in the first film. She breathes much needed life into this film. A breath of fresh air. Would I have loved to see the film be about her finding her way back to Eywa instead of rehashing the previous movie? Yep. But, I’ll take what we got here because she’s the highpoint for me.
I also enjoy watching Kiri whose connection with Eywa gets explored again, which leads to some great scenes. I think the point here is that the female characters are far more interesting than the male. Not sure why. Their dialogue isn’t as cheesy – they don’t call each other bro – and they tend to add more substance.
Speaking of James Cameron’s bad dialogue writing skills – I honestly believe that he’s just trolling us for all our complaints. He actually throws in a ‘pinky swear’ and Stephen Lang’s delivery suggests he’s in on the joke. Cameron has made some of the most memorable movies ever. Perhaps the cheesy dialogue is part of their charm. What would Titanic be without I’m King of the World? Aliens without Stay away from her, you bitch? Avatar without Not in this economy? The lines add some unintentional humor, that’s for sure. Perhaps Cameron could employ an editor? Give us dialogue that matches Pandora in a distant future, not 2025 Earth. Le sigh.
If you loved the first two, you’ll love this. It’s better than The Way of Water, but falls short of the first film. Too many characters following too many plot points to get emotionally invested in as much. The environmental and religious themes are all still there, front and center, convoluting the plot the wants to revolve around guns and military jargon. But maybe who cares? It’s still a masterclass in the CGI spectacle that Cameron spent two decades perfecting. With a better story, maybe it wouldn’t have felt like 3 hours. One Battle After Another proved that a great story with cool cinematography makes a long movie fly by quickly. Cameron could learn a thing or two from that.
3 out of 5 stars. Would have been 4 or 5 if Varang was the main character.
Discover more from Becky Tyler Art and Photography
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