REVIEW: Avatar - The Way of Water

Once upon a time, James Cameron ordering four sequels up front to a single movie seemed, at best, excessive, and at worst, pompous. But from the other end of Avatar: The Way of Water, we'll have to see if five volumes are enough.

It's been thirteen years, almost to the day, since our first adventure on Pandora, and the time between that first film and this new sequel is roughly the same. After their humiliating defeat, the industrial forces that terrorized the planet way back then have regrouped and are back to finish what they started. But for a vengeful enemy, this larger mission is a blanket covering for something a little more personal. An old foe wants retribution against the warriors who defeated him. Once upon a time, Jake and Neytiri would have stood their ground and struck right the heart of anyone who dared take what is theirs. But they're no longer just fighters. They're parents, and they're not about to lead their young children into a warzone. This leads them to leave behind their home in search of a place where they might be safe again.

It would be easy is to write-off the film's visual wonderland as nothing more than cinematic opioid. But the strength of this film, and its predecessor, doesn't really lie in its incredible texturing or even the neon color palette. Cameron is the kind of filmmaker who knows that when an audience wants romance, they want to see two young lovers spreading their wings together at the head of the boat at sunset. He knows how to anticipate what experiences will unlock the audience's sense of wonder, and he knows which experiences can only be brought to life onscreen. Taming a dinosaur whale, for example, really high on my list of things I wish I could do.

These cinematic playgrounds play out in time with the story's emotional pulse. Jake and Neytiri have earned their happy ending, but larger forces with sinister intentions leave that happy ending in question. The story sees some colossal set pieces and action sequences (including a thrilling underwater chase through a kelp forest that must have been a marathon to choreograph), but the tensions are more localized and more intimate than the first film, which isn't always the case in follow-ups. The stakes are weighed in the lives of individuals, not just broader communities.

There's a whole new generation of characters in the ensemble, and audiences will have to wrestle with which of Jake and Neytiri's kids are their favorite. The two that receive the most attention are Lo'ak, their second oldest and most eager to prove that he is every bit a warrior as his father, and Kiri, a sort of alien update to the dreamy pixie girl who's always drawing in her notebook. All of them have their own character beats, all of them are brought to life vividly by their respective performers. (I almost wish it had been kept a secret that Kiri was played by Sigourney Weaver, who would have been pushing seventy at the time, just so I could see whether I or anyone would have picked up on it naturally.)

"Spider" the human child who plays alongside Jake and Neytiri's kids, also bears mentioning here since he poses some of the most interesting questions served by the sequel. The in-universe backstory is that after being orphaned during the battle of the last film, Spider has grown up on Pandora and he feels special kinship with the Na'vi people, especially the Sully family. His story is fascinating but underserved. He may get his dues in the coming installments, but in this film you just want him on screen more. Count that as a strength or a shortcoming. Your choice.

Believe it or not, even at nearly 200 minutes, the movie would have benefited much from an even longer runtime. Cameron obviously has a sprawling story he wants to tell, in this film specifically and those it sets up, and he wants to get to the good stuff a little too quickly. (I mean, I guess he has been holding out for over a decade ...) Certain scenes can feel squashed together with little breathing room or preamble. It's more a question of tempo rather than losing out on specific narrative information, and the issue becomes less noticeable as the story advances, culminating in a satisfying five-course third act.

And I guess that's the worst I can say about this film. You want more of it. You want more racing on the reptile dolphins. You want more Jake-Neytiri family meetings. You just know there's more story to tell.

If James Cameron hadn't earned the right to tell that story with the first film, he certainly has now.

--The Professor

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