Avatar: The Way of Water shares a lot in common with its predecessor Avatar (2009). It has jaw dropping gorgeous visual effects, striking action, and a devotion to earnest world building. It's then unfortunate to say it also shares the first film’s paper-thin plot and even weaker character development.
The movie is directed by self-titled King-of-the-World James Cameron and stars Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Sigourney Weaver, Stephen Lang, and Kate Winslet. The film picks up several years after Avatar. Jake Sully (Worthington) lives with his newfound family formed on the extrasolar moon Pandora. Once a familiar threat returns to finish what was previously started, Jake must work with Neytiri and the army of the Na'vi race to protect their home.
There is much to like here. Of course, the main standout is the incredible CGI work to bring this world to life. Throughout the film's runtime I kept forgetting that this world is almost entirely CGI. The beautiful landscapes and natural environments combined with the clear cinematography make this world come alive and feel so real. The returning forest locations from the first film look great but it's when the story moves to Pandora’s Oceans that the time and effort put into this world become apparent. I have never seen water look this good on film. The way it moves, reflections that appear in it, how objects interact with it. The water scenes in this movie are worth the price of the ticket alone. It’s obvious from all Cameron's previous work that he loves water and undersea exploration and you can really tell as his love of the environment is front and center in this movie. Cameron’s crafting of the action scenes, one would argue his bread and butter, is also on point here as well. The action is clear and concise, creating easy to follow sequences that are exciting to sit through. The way Cameron incorporates all the creatures of Pandora in the action as well is very inventive and further shows Cameron's imagination and world building.
However, we now come to the element of the film that just does not work, The Story. It's unfortunate that such a beautiful film is hampered by such a weak plot and narrative punch. If you thought the first film’s story was lacking, you are going to find the same here. The film’s structure and plot exist solely to move our characters to a new setting to explore the ocean. It’s not that there is no story or that it's convoluted, it's just that the story is… well it's just… just. It's the vanilla wafer of film plots. Reading the back of a Brand Flakes box is more interesting than this narrative. OK I get that Cameron intentionally makes his film’s plots accessible to a wide range of people, heck it worked perfectly for Titanic. Romeo and Juliet set aboard a ship sailing to its destiny is a very approachable plot that Cameron was then able to overlay the disaster and study of human nature in a crisis on. However here in the Avatar world this simplistic Family fighting for survival story just feels too small in what is supposed to be this grand epic. It's noticeable here just enough throughout the film’s runtime that when the credits started to roll all I could help but think was “that's it?” It was even more of a shock to then see that 3 people worked on the script that has a story credit from 5 people. How could a story this flimsy need 5 people to come up with? The film is littered with plotlines and characters that are set up but just forgotten. This wouldn't be as big of a sin as it is if not for the fact that it's been 13 years since the first Avatar movie, and that film was criticized for its thin plot. I just would have thought that maybe Cameron and Company would have poured extra time into the narrative to combat those criticisms.
The resolutions to the very few character plot lines are hampered by the obvious sequel setups. The film knows there will be a next one and so it never bothers to wrap up any kind of emotional arc or change in these characters. The closest we get is a new character by the name of Spider (Jack Champion), a human that stayed behind on Pandora after the first film. Throughout the film he is presented with moments that seem to make him question his allegiances to the different authority figures in his life, but the film never goes far enough with him, and in the end his development seems purposely ignored to continue in the sequel. Similarly, our main character Jake Sully faces a character loop instead of an arc, with his motivations coming full circle to line up with his position at the start of the film. This is dangerous in a scripting manner because it could leave your audience detached from the character’s journey throughout the film, leaving the viewer feeling like time was wasted on development that is now pointless.
I feel that I should comment on the runtime of the film, since I know there will be people that don’t like it based solely on the movie being over 3 hours but surprisingly the film did not feel long to sit through. This is no doubt helped by the last hour essentially being one long action sequence. I have to give Cameron the credit here, he does know how to pace a film and keep you distracted by the incredible visuals.
Despite my harsh words towards the narrative side of the film, Avatar: TWoW is still an enjoyable enough time, propped up by its visuals and suspenseful action sequences. I feel like if you were fond of the first one you will like this one as well, but if you had issues in the first one those same issues are back again. I do however feel it is worth seeing on the biggest screen to fully enjoy the visual spectacle the way Cameron intended it.
Avatar: The Way of Water final score: 7.5/10
variety.com
