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SF author Greg Egan reviews Avatar

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Re: SF author Greg Egan reviews Avatar

#101

Post by radley »

blehn wrote: post #71
radley wrote: post #47

Greg Egan reviewing Avatar is like Jakob Nielsen reviewing the 2Advanced website. Totally different levels and types of craft, as many seem to forget.

There's a certain degree subjectivity in any review. That said, I'd have to say that beyond the obvious usability failures, 2Advanced is a rather dreadful website.

Uhm... ok.

BTW, the current 2Advanced website was a fluke. Their previous site (which won tons of awards and business) had been around for 5+ years. Eric Jordan, their founder and lead designer was doing a series of matte paintings just for fun. Someone on the team said they'd make great artwork for the website and thus v4.

Re: SF author Greg Egan reviews Avatar

#102

Post by grannyg00se »

patio11 wrote: post #45
lionhearted wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, Princess Mononoke is really a lovely film. I thought when Spirited Away came out and became popular that people would naturally go back and check out Mononoke, but it didn't happen that much. Definitely worth a watch. As for Avatar - My two biggest complaints: 1. It paints it as black and white, good vs. evil. This is such a common source of human misery and brainwashing that I thought we'd started to move past…

Yeah. An alternate reading of Avatar (supported by the text) is the story of a stolid marine colonel's tragic death in support of a mission to establish humanity's last hope for escaping the dying Earth. Sending humanity back at the end of the movie, with the exception of two collaborators, is genocide of the entire human race. I know, that isn't quite the Wars For Oil Suck, Love Your Purple Bambi Earth Goddesses Or…

"a mission to establish humanity's last hope for escaping the dying Earth" is not a scenario that is reasonably interpreted by viewing of the film. In what "text" is this reading supported?

In the film, the humans are there on behalf of a corporation interested in mining natural resources for profit. That position is made clear. There is no indication at all that Earth is in need of this resource for any other reason than corporate greed. As mentioned elsewhere, the story is pretty black & white that way.

Re: SF author Greg Egan reviews Avatar

#103

Post by gaius »

chops wrote: post #96
gaius wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know if you've seen Hero but that is an amazingly beautiful film. The sets, the lighting, the costumes, the actors, everything is gorgeous. You could take almost any still from it and blow it up and put it on the wall. It is set in the Chinese equivalent of the Western mediaeval period, and has all these perfect little vignettes, like a miniature visual essay into the nature of raindrops falling on a sword. B…

I guess I'm dense (or uninformed), but I never picked up on that in Hero .

The Taiwanese view Taiwan as the "true China" and dream of the day the Communists are out of power so they can go home. The Chinese view Taiwan as a rebel breakaway province and would very much like it "back". That's what Hero is about - any amount of sacrifice and slaughter is worth it to "reunify" China.

Re: SF author Greg Egan reviews Avatar

#104

Post by Shamiq »

RiderOfGiraffes wrote: post #89

Massive, massive spoiler alerts!! If you haven't seen the film and want to see the film and don't want to know every detail before-hand, don't read this thread. It (the thread) has taught me to avoid HN when there's a new film around. Most likely this comment will sink to the bottom and not serve its purpose of protecting the casual browser (person, not application), but for as long as it stays at or near the top, it…

You get my up-vote. Only a few more days before the SO and I can get out to the theater.

And I'll give you a few more lines so that it'll cover larger screens (i've got 1200 pixels to make up for).

Re: SF author Greg Egan reviews Avatar

#105

Post by RiderOfGiraffes »

Shamiq wrote: post #104
RiderOfGiraffes wrote: post #89

Massive, massive spoiler alerts!! If you haven't seen the film and want to see the film and don't want to know every detail before-hand, don't read this thread. It (the thread) has taught me to avoid HN when there's a new film around. Most likely this comment will sink to the bottom and not serve its purpose of protecting the casual browser (person, not application), but for as long as it stays at or near the top, it…

You get my up-vote. Only a few more days before the SO and I can get out to the theater. And I'll give you a few more lines so that it'll cover larger screens (i've got 1200 pixels to make up for).

Thanks. Someone either disagrees or had a slip of the finger, because they down-voted it. Perhaps it was deliberate and they want the spoilers to be here. Who knows.

However, if people want to keep the spoiler protector in place, but not give me the karma for it, feel free to upmod the spoiler protector and downmod this comment to balance it.

Re: SF author Greg Egan reviews Avatar

#106

Post by gojomo »

Tichy wrote: post #82
anigbrowl wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In a nutshell, the audience for nuanced, elaborately plotted scripts is not as big as that for epic hammy ones. The movie industry ( qua theaters) is not really about movies so much as it is a marketing operation for comfy chairs, sugary drinks, and popcorn. Hence the big-budget movie emphasis on the 'wow' factor, best appreciated via a 75-foot screen. To some extent, it's always been this way. Look at Shakespeare: m…

It doesn't have to be complicated, but at least it should be realistic. For example it bothered me that the flora and fauna on Pandora was completely unrealistic. I don't think horses would have a very good time in the jungle, for example. If it was realistic (ie adhere to evolution theory), then one could still learn something from the movie, even if the plot was shallow. Likewise in terms of evolution theory, I won…

I don't think horses would have a very good time in the jungle

It was clear by the end the whole planet wasn't jungle; there was nothing to imply the horse-like creatures evolved in the jungle.

I suppose the whole world would have to be an artificial creation by an ancient high tech race or something

Shhh! No spoilers about the sequels!

Re: SF author Greg Egan reviews Avatar

#107

Post by ericd »

archon wrote: post #86
brown9-2 wrote: post #38

Is it a waste to see this movie in 2D?

I've seen it now in both 3D and 2D. You lose some of the wow factor of the visuals in 2D, but it's still beautifully rendered either way. I also found that the 2D seemed to have more color depth than the 3D, but that might just have been my eyes trying to adjust to the 3D glasses.

It might be because each eye only sees every other frame in the 3D version (assuming this is on a single projecter with an alternating polarizer and not two projectors with different film and different polarization).

Re: SF author Greg Egan reviews Avatar

#108

Post by stavrianos »

abecedarius wrote: post #44
matasar wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are his books as overwritten as this review? Honest question, as I found the review pretty leaden, but I'm always looking for interesting sci-fi.

I recommend three of them: Permutation City, Diaspora, and Axiomatic. Here's the opening chapter of Diaspora: http://gregegan.customer.netspace.net.au/DIASPORA/01/Orphano...

no Quarantine?

Re: SF author Greg Egan reviews Avatar

#109

Post by Tichy »

gojomo wrote: post #106
Tichy wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't have to be complicated, but at least it should be realistic. For example it bothered me that the flora and fauna on Pandora was completely unrealistic. I don't think horses would have a very good time in the jungle, for example. If it was realistic (ie adhere to evolution theory), then one could still learn something from the movie, even if the plot was shallow. Likewise in terms of evolution theory, I won…

I don't think horses would have a very good time in the jungle It was clear by the end the whole planet wasn't jungle; there was nothing to imply the horse-like creatures evolved in the jungle. I suppose the whole world would have to be an artificial creation by an ancient high tech race or something Shhh! No spoilers about the sequels!

Must have missed the non-jungle parts. Not saying horses are impossible, but it was just so cliched...

As for the high tech race: ironically, the world was kind of created by such a high tech race - Cameron and his team :-)

Re: SF author Greg Egan reviews Avatar

#110

Post by abecedarius »

stavrianos wrote: post #108
abecedarius wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recommend three of them: Permutation City, Diaspora, and Axiomatic. Here's the opening chapter of Diaspora: http://gregegan.customer.netspace.net.au/DIASPORA/01/Orphano...

no Quarantine?

I liked Quarantine. The only Egan novel I thought a complete waste of time was Teranesia. But I'd recommend one of the three I listed first to see if he's for you.
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