Movie Review: First Impressions of "Avatar" + Cine-Sib Haiku (Updated with More Haiku!)

Pretty much, yeah. (Via Geeks Are Sexy.)

Two nights ago, the Cinema-Mad Sibling and I went to see "Avatar" in 3D IMAX.

Initial impressions with full review to come:

• Visual sensory supersaturation overload. I literally got a pounding physical headache by the end of it.
  
• Special effects were grand and grandiose, but after a while, they actually began to distract and even to bore. I could go on, but see the end of Part 6 here for the basic idea.
• The plot is basically both completely derivative and completely asinine. Everyone and their grandma's been saying how it's a total ripoff of "Dances With Wolves" (which is itself not that original either, but it's probably the best-known recent-ish flick that has the white-man-goes-native idea), and it's true. The flick is "Dances With Space Smurfs in psychedelic Ferngully." Plus "The Last Samurai."
  
• James Cameron rips off plenty of movies, and he also rips off himself.
• The flick is definitely worth seeing once in full 3D IMAX big-screen glory for full appreciation of its visual splendor, but the narrative is idiotic and a mishmash of just about every other kind of soggy sentiment about White Guilt, the Exotic Other, and the Noble Savage.
• Sam Worthington does a fine job as Jake Sully. Well, in as far as he can do a good job in his role. The Aussie actor's personal charisma manages to make Sully not completely stupid (just as it managed to make his Marcus Wright character in the disappointing "Terminator: Salvation" virtually that movie's only bright spot besides Anton Yelchin).
  
• You'll never look at USB connections in the same way again.
• In terms of CGI that "looks real," this is good, but it comes in the aftermath of Gollum of "Lord of the Rings" and the flick that for me really did break ground in special effects, 1993's "Jurassic Park." Those darn dinosaurs looked believable. "Avatar" and Pandora looked like we'd suddenly been sucked into a massive (though beautiful) video game. OK, I can't help myself: floating mountains? Puh-leeez.
• UNOBTAINIUM?????
  

I have to go now, but you can read these reviews until I post my full review:

• io9's take
• Crazy alien fetish

Yes, the Sib loved "Avatar." He says that the special effects are awesome even though the story is weak and cliched. This prompted (natch) an argument about spectacle versus substance. Pretty images just aren't enough to merit the praise of greatness.

Anyway, here are his haiku reviews:

Story seen before
Sensory overload, CRASH!
A big Blue Man Group.

White man v. natives
White man becomes a native
White man kills his own

Hometree is massive
Really big ethernet hub
Hey girl, plug me in

Final battle, wow!
Inorganic, organic
Metal versus flesh