I finally saw Avatar last night. Yes, I know I am about a month late to the party, but better later than never. As most of you already know Avatar is James Cameron’s latest film that has recorded record box office numbers. Most interesting however is the 3D technology introduced with the film. A lot of people have discussed its importance to the future of film making and its validity beyond a gimmick. If you had asked me yesterday morning I, like a lot of other people would have passed it off as being simply a gimmick, but after last night I have become a believer.
Whereas in the past 3D has been overused or inappropriately used just to give a film a “wow” factor, Avatar uses the technology far more thoughtfully: to actually improve the story itself. The story is coincidentally one of the points that many critics choose to attack Avatar for. Admittedly the script isn’t on the same level that many of the great classics, but that is where technology comes in. James Cameron uses it in such a way that it enhances the immersion in the word of Pandora (the planet that the story takes place on). The 3D allows for a deeper emotional connection to the characters and the places that normal 2D images couldn’t capture. Near the middle of the film the main character Jake talks about how his life in the outside world had become the real world, and his life on the military base was the dream. As the film ends and I took off the glasses I felt the same way. I was leaving the world I wanted so badly to believe in and was thrown back into a world I wished was just the dream.
When you see the film 3 times you notice things that make the story much deeper than it originally shows. There was so much more foreshadowing than I had ever realized before and most of the plant and animal life, even the machines, on Pandora have a story behind themselves. The story isn’t so easy to find because the AMAZING visuals are in front of it.