Perhaps it's because of the movie, perhaps it's because I'm a tad drunk. Who knows. But I feel now, even more offended and put off by this movie now than I was seeing it. Firstly, allow me to say that the movie's visuals are beautiful and the directing is spotless (mostly). I have no beef with M. Night Shamallamadingdong's directing style; it's his writing and story telling that really forget this film up the ass. Hard.
For the record, I was not an avid fan of the cartoon series. I'd seen it, and enjoyed it to some extent. It was interesting and worth my time watching it. Imagine yourself as a kid who loves this show on Nick, and is overjoyed with the idea of seeing his favorite characters on the silver screen, bending it like Beckham with their elements. Now, chances are that child will be overwhelmed with it all and probably enjoy it. But let's be real, that child knows nothing about movies. This is where I come in.
So, first off, we must start with how god damned rushed this film was. And I don't mean it in a sense of production. I mean the god damned story telling. What the show had was 20 episodes, each a half an hour to tell an over arching story, which also gave it free reign to wander off occasionally to the tune of sub plots, but that's acceptable. This movie tries to take those 20 episodes, a half an hour each, which is ten hours, and cram it all into a tiny little 2 hour sitting. It was disgusting the level of pace it took. "Hey, what's this in the water- oh forget it's the avatar- oh forget the fire nation- oh forget they took him- oh forget we have to go rescue him, he's like totally the greatest thing ever", and that was just the first ten minutes. She didn't even know he was the Avatar yet.
Secondly, and possibly worse than the crack cocaine pace of the film, was that they changed his god damned name. It's Aang, pronounced A- N - G, like Angus. This was established in the cartoon. Everyone calls him Aang. But now, no, forget you and your stupid little cartoon, his name is pronounced ung, because it just wasn't Asian enough for us. Every time any character said his name, I felt like screaming: "ANG, ANG, ANG, ANG!"
But you want to know what was worse than that? I could have easily taken all of the flaws stated so far, and had a semi-decent film. BUT. NO. The acting. The, god damned, acting. Seriously? Sure, some of these actors were screen virgins, and to them I give them the benefit of the doubt. But seriously, that kid from Slum Dog Millionaire? Which won so many awards and stuff? He was terrible. Not only was all the cast completely unfitting to the characters they're supposed to be portraying, but the kid playing the fire nation prince just couldn't get it down. He could not get arrogance. Something every egotistical actor just cannot live without. He was too angry when he shouldn't be, too arrogant when he clearly was an starfish, and just too angst throughout.
Perhaps though, I shouldn't blame it on the actors. Perhaps it wasn't their fault. Then, you might ask, whom should I place the blame? Why, they were simply reading what was on the page. So, guess what? The writer! Who wrote this awful piece of horse stuff you might ask? Why, it was Shamallamadingdong! He was credited with directing, writing, and producing this crapfest. The dialog was so bland and dull, that it was laughable. There were scenes where you would laugh, just at how bad it sounded, and it was supposed to be a serious scene! Here's an example: the water nation princess is telling Saka, or whatever, (SPOILER)how she's going to give her life so the moon spirit can live.(SPOILER) She says: "we're going to show the fire nation that we believe in what we believe in as much as they believe in what they believe in." Or something very similar. Believe, believe, believe. Seriously? How confusing is that phrase, really? It's acted terribly, and written even worse, and leaves you feeling sick that you speak the same language and that someone could use it in such a vile and boring way.
The story did its best to follow the cartoon, but the changes Shamallama did to it, it just doesn't make it. Literally, it was like watching a rehashing of Star Wars. Which, is just like what Eragon did. Yeah, I went there, not only was the movie awful, Eragon the book was unoriginal and just boring as hell. But, I digress. This movie had one thing going for it, and that was this: the fight scenes were actually smooth and took place in one shot. No crazy shaking and moving about the place like it's Hati, just smooth, simple fight scenes with great special effects.
The worst part is, this is expected to be a trilogy, and while this film to me just didn't cut it to be worthy of even one sequel, I do know that Viacom would love to milk it for all its worth. Expect to see Avatar: The Second to Last Airbender soon. So, among all else, don't see this film. Oh, and don't see it in 3D either. I was lucky enough to be in a theater that didn't offer it in 3D, else I would have wasted the money for it. If you're really that egar to see it, and have higher hopes for this film than I offer, wait for DVD. Really, it is just not worth seeing in theaters. Most of the time I felt like giving my two bit commentary on it, which I couldn't because the theater was rather packed actually. My friends decided to do so, though, and the black gentlemen in front of him would have probably beaten him senseless. Really though, we were saving him the trouble of watching.
TL;DR: Don't see it. Over hyped, underacted, and poorly written. Don't waste the time nor the money.
