James Cameron is truly a visionary director whose worldbuilding in the AVATAR movies is almost unparalleled. The visual effects and CGI-rendered imagery in his third AVATAR film are as jaw-droppingly impressive as they were in the previous two outings. And few filmmakers can storyboard an action scene with both the clarity and exhilaration like Cameron can.
So, why did I wish Cameron’s newest entry – AVATAR: FIRE AND ASH – was done a mere hour into its three hour and 17-minute run time?
Simple.
The story felt so familiar to the previous two films AVATAR and AVATAR: THE WAY OF WATER that it became redundant, even feeling reductive.
Same villains. Same heroics. Same schtick. Yet, AVATAR: FIRE AND ASH felt even more violent than the previous two films. Cameron’s screenplay about the peace-loving Na’vi may preach about being at one with the planet from the trees to the ancestry to the various inhabitants, but boy, it sure loves to destroy all of it with heavy artillery, flame throwers, and bombs that would make Pete Hegsweth envious. In fact, there is so much violence in this third installment that at times Cameron seems to be almost fetishizing the hardware. Too many automatic weapons, too many explosions, too much death. Not nearly enough originality, fresh characters, or surprising plotting.
And when a giant sea creature shows up with multiple harpoons lodged in his suffering body, including a blinding one to his eye, I wanted to close my eyes on the whole shebang. Dare I say, I think we have reached the limits of what Cameron has to say in this franchise, and it’s time for the master filmmaker to move on instead of milking this idea any more.
I can tell you the plot here involves a new tribe on Pandora called The Ash people and that they’re folks that love fire, volcanos, and burning things to the ground like children playing with matches. The Ash people all too easily partner with the villainous Sky People (Earthlings, as you’ll recall, mostly American military) to wreak havoc on their fellow Na’vi in a quest to rule the planet and mine its resources. But that’s about as new as it gets. Everything else feels very familiar. Stephen Lang’s villainous avatar is back, as are all the characters from the previous film doing their same schtick. The dialogue is often corny, going on and on about not giving in to hate, and feeling the ancestry in every flower or creature. And Zoe Saldaña will fret and hiss and fight like hell as lead character/Earth momma Neyteri just like in the first two films. I get it. I got it all in the first two films.
The entire enterprise here comes dangerously close to feeling cynical, like Cameron isn’t really trying to tell a great story anymore, merely milk his IP for all its worth. Perhaps that is okay for true blue fans, but not for this viewer. I loved AVATAR. I liked AVATAR: THE WAY OF WATER. I can admire much of AVATAR: FIRE AND ASH.
But I could hardly wait for it to be over.
