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News Corp’s UK newspaper The Sun claimed it had the Avatar trailer numero uno. Then again, Apple/iTunes actually had first dibs for a 24-hour window. Now Fox is sending “take down” notices to everybody else. What a cock-up. I’m so sick of all the hype and secrecy. But now we can presume to know why Twentieth Century Fox and Jim Cameron were keeping it under wraps for so long. The Avatar trailer makes it look, um, er, like a Disney movie. I swear Twink was in there. Maybe a Pixar character or two. A lot of you think Cameron caught Lucas flu and express surprise Jar Jar Binks got his own movie. Others fear this is Dances With Wolves set in space. Please, Jim, guarantee us this is not another The Abyss. Or worse.
Editor-in-Chief Nikki Finke - tip her here.
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mega-bomb
Lots of baffled reactions to this today after so much hype. It seems Cameron had a sci-fi Dances with Wolves in mind, but he’s accidentally wound up with a CGI cartoon Ferngully. The cartoon look is especially surprising after Cameron hyped “photo-realistic” CG (rather than the story) for years. With a running time that’ll supposedly stretch past the two and a half hour mark, competing for Christmas weekend against Robert Downey Jr in Sherlock Holmes seems like a rougher prospect than ever.
Hahaa.
Horrible.
Might as well sit through a cartoon.
To all the people bitching and moaning about the CG (ie. fat lazy slob computer geeks playing with themselves to the latest Megan Fox-riddled trailer)… what the hell is he supposed to do? Make it on a soundstage with a bunch of spraypainted plastic reeds being blown around by a ritter fan? Actors jumping around in cheeseball rubber suits? Waste tens of millions of dollars building semi-real sets (aka Peter Jackson, “King Kong”) that end up looking CG anyway after the film has been scanned, CG-augmented, and stuck back on film? If you’re going to make an ENTIRE ALIEN WORLD and IMMERSE THE VIEWER IN IT you have no choice but to use CG. That’s just how filmmaking works today.
The sheer depth, scale and enormity of the visuals will not translate/reduce to a lame Quicktime movie anyway.
JC is no dummy. He is saving the best bits for last — I’m sure the last half hour will OWN YOU just like Titanic did (say what you will about the first 4/5 of Titanic, it’s the last 1/5 that knocks the audience out).
JC is a pioneer in film technology. Name another director who develops his own frickin’ camera system. He would not — and best of all, can **afford** not — to settle for 2nd rate visuals.
I guess my biggest concern is how the whole “big bad military” vs. the tree-hugging, Ferngully, environmental stuff plays. Pray that the inevitable Billy Zane-type character does not get too much screen time.
Looks retarded…I bet it will be a huge hit.
Cameron is directly responsible for the modern tentpole jizz-fest and he has become its latest victim. Fox can’t be happy about this. I guess that is the problem is that when you are King of the World, nobody pulls you aside and says, “look dude, it looks like Peter Jackson playing Final Fantasy on an Xbox. Maybe you should throw a Jar Jar Binks in there or something that screams FUN.”
I don’t know, not only do the CGI characters look CGI, the real actors looked CGI too. While the detail in the landscapes were very nice, it looked too much like a cut-scene in a video game for my liking.
The plot sounds like Dances with Wolves in space, and the preview and production stills haven’t stoked anything in me but concern about this movie turning out to be a big disappointment.
Which is a shame, because I grew up on James Cameron movies in the 80s and 90s.
Well worth the wait. Can’t wait to see the whole thing.
Uh oh.
Looks like Jim may have caught Lucas Flu — he’s exhibiting all the symptoms…
first look? didn’t the trailer come out today?
http://www.apple.com/trailers/fox/avatar/
first impression is that it looks like another CGI crapfest, a la george lucas. but i’m hoping there’s a good story in there that will make me want to care about what i’m watching. don’t let me down jimmy c.
Lots of baffled reactions to this today after so much hype. It seems Cameron had a sci-fi Dances with Wolves in mind, but he’s accidentally wound up with a CGI cartoon Ferngully. The cartoon look is especially surprising after Cameron sold the film on the merits of its “photo-realistic” CG (rather than the story) for years. With a running time that’ll supposedly stretch past the two and a half hour mark, competing for Christmas weekend against Robert Downey Jr in Sherlock Holmes seems like a rougher prospect than ever.
Did Jar Jar Binks really need his own movie?
Looks incredible to me. I, for one, cannot wait for this….
1.4B Worldwide. 500M domestic.
I have to say that while I will give the theatrical release viewing experience the benefit of the doubt, with regard to Jim’s “new” CGI and 3-D technology, this trailer does not inspire confidence.
Watching it makes me think I am watching graphics from a computer and/or video game. The Na’avi do not look realistic enough for my taste.
Not interested. And I thought I would be.
Eyes and slow motion still seem to be impacted by the Polar Express effect.
Cameron has trolled us.
This is going to be awful.
I kept waiting for Jar Jar Binks to walk through the frame.
Meh.
That is super cheesy looking 3d graphics. I can only hope James Cameron’s sense of storytelling can elevate this in a way that we couldn’t possibly tell from the trailer. I was annoyed just watching a couple of minutes, and I have stayed away from all other video game looking films that have come out.
Just because something takes forever doesn’t mean it will be epic. Evidence – Chinese Democracy.
Underwhelming considering the uber-hype.
Would rather watch paint dry – looks dreadful
if you watch the 1080p trailer, the level of detail is incredible. its funny tho – cameron has said that it was watching gollum that made up his mind on the feasibility of the project. But his lot really don’t seem to look or move anywhere near as convincingly as gollum
um, nikke, it was on apple’s quicktime pages. what are you talking about.
Some cool stuff … definitely not groundbreaking as promised