Images are from Olafur Eliasson and Ma Yansong’s “Feelings Are Facts,” an art exhibit currently on display now at the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art in Beijing from now until June, 2010.
So what does everyone think of the Avatar trailer?
It’s so weird to me to see it actually existing now, not that it’s particulary great or anything, but just because I think I first heard of this project what… ten years ago? It’s easily one of those Chinese Democracys of cinema.
Maybe it’s just me, but I guess I expected more from the trailer for James Cameron’s long awaited film. I expected things that it obviously couldn’t really live up to, since it’s been talked about and speculated about so much in the past decade. What’ll be interesting is to see what it really is when it comes to life in this reality.
But one of the things that gets me is that the trailer really favors what looks like simple CGI effects work, not terribly dissimilar from things we’ve seen in the past 5 or so years. The Na’vi creatures, in trailer form, don’t strike me as spectacular creations at all. I’d much rather just look at Zoe Saldana in one of those outfits as she is. Actual look-wise, I get the same vibe from the tall, blue alien race/tribe that I got from seeing the Hulk in Ang Lee’s 2003 film (which, I don’t care what anyone says, is still a fine movie, especially if you chop off the last half an hour).
But then there’s a real story somewhere in Avatar, with real actors like Sigourney Weaver and Michelle Rodriguez (is it me or is Ana Lucia the only character you haven’t heard about returning for Lost‘s final season?) and Giovanni Ribisi, which I’m not sure I’m all that interested in. If you know nothing of Avatar, I’ll spare you, but it’s essentially The Last Samurai or Dances With Wolves in outer space.
Also, apropos of nothing really, I find Giovanni Ribisi ridiculous. I don’t know why, but I just can’t help it. He’s good with comedic roles, but I can never take him seriously in dramatic roles. Maybe he’s just too good at what he does (which is shit like co-starring in the Gone In Sixty Seconds remake with Nic Cage and that episode of The X-Files, “D.P.O.“). Anyway, that picture below gives me a total Airplane! vibe.
Anticipation for Avatar is a mixed bag, certainly. On one hand, I like a lot of the projects that James Cameron has unleashed in the past, or been involved in, such as the career of his ex-wife Kathryn Bigelow or producing Soderbergh’s Solaris remake. He hasn’t put his face out there in a while, but the man is a pillar of the cinema, and someone who actually cares about pushing the technology of moviemaking forward, augmenting the reality for creators (even if it does involve rising movie ticket prices). But I still get a negative vibe from him, you know, as a person.
What can I say? The guy seems like a dick. Right?
But then again, I don’t have to like him (and doesn’t he look like somebody’s uptight dad from an 80s teen flick?). I always enjoyed True Lies, but it took me years to see it as a parody of sexism and not just a fun spy parody that also happened to be sexist. I could be wrong though in my interpretation. James Cameron may have actually intended it to be sexist and that all women are “biscuits.”
Eh, Avatar, whatever. I want it to be good. I’m hoping that it plays out like a nice counterpart to something like Where The Wild Things Are, with Spike Jonze’s take on the Maurice Sendak book being something for the kid in all of us…
…And Avatar being something for the adult in all of us who’s worried about the environment and indigenous peoples and fucking weirdly hot alien girls.
“Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn’t go away.”
A short post today but I think I want to start slowly talking about things I love, well, more things I love than I usually talk about, I guess you could say. But today I’m going to start with one of the movies I’m really looking forward to coming out this year. In fact, it’s probably the only other movie that I’m really looking forward to coming out this year…
Of course I’m talking about Spike Jonze’s adaptation of Maurice Sendak’s Where The Wild Things Are. I think Videogum summed up the initial appeal of this movie (based on it’s awesome trailer) perfectly:
This thing seriously looks scientifically designed to fuck up the hipsters’ shit. Do the math. Spike Jonze + Arcade Fire + Nostalgia + Magic + Monsters + Divorced Moms + Snowballs + Scribble Font + Shouting Off a Cliff.
For real. Sendak’s book was one of my absolute favorites growing up, another being Madeleine L’Engle’s A Wrinkle In Time, which I try to reread at least once a year, but I don’t just want to mention the book/movie today. What I actually wanted to direct your attention to was the blog for the film, We Love You So.
It’s a fascinating collection of bits about the film along with nods towards it’s influences and like-minded pieces of wonderfulness. I spent a delightful hour or so just browsing through all the entries on there the other night and I’d recommend you throw the site into your favorites and check it out whenever you’re in dire need of a smile or just something interesting.
One of the contributors is one of my favorite writers (that you can find on the internet, though I can’t imagine she’ll be confined to just the internet for long), Molly Young, and there’s a few other writers there too whom I don’t know of yet. Spike Jonze is supposed to poke in and out of the blog on occasion and… well, that’s enough out of me. Go check it out, okay?
And this is me showing you where the wild things really are (in case you were curious):
“Four legs good, two legs bad.”
Mad linkage:
The pictures in this post (except one) are all by Dave Eggers., from a portfolio of his entitled “It Is Right To Draw Their Fur.”
via Google.
“I change shapes just to hide in this place but I’m still an animal.”
“There are two things for which animals are to be envied: they know nothing of future evils, or of what people say about them.”
Sleeping insects
from 
from 
The really real world of augmented reality.
