The Stuff I Watched: The Idea of You, Avatar
Hopefully you don't hate me for my Avatar take.
Morning!
I finally got around to the highest grossing movie of all time. Safe to say, I thought it was mid.
The Idea of You (2024)
Director: Michael Showalter
C
Make no mistake, Anne Hathaway CARRIES this film. If there was any actress of lesser quality in this role, The Idea of You would be a mediocre slog with Nicholas Galitzine trying his best to seem charming.
Hathaway’s presence brings a subtextual reading of the film where we see the 41-year old actress grapple with her celebrity while moving into a new phase of her life. Her transition from middle-aged suburban divorcee mom to tabloid fodder feels so natural because she has played roles like this before and has gone through that process in real life.
Is there anything wildly profound that The Idea of You has to say about stardom and understanding one self? Not really, but there is an attempt of dramatic complexity that I respect from a streaming romcom.
Summary: A 40-year-old single mom (Anne Hathaway) begins an unexpected romance with a 24-year-old boy band singer (Nicholas Galitzine).
Avatar (2009)
Director: James Cameron
B-
Maybe my life would’ve been different if I watched this in theaters as a precocious young 7-year old. But alas, I never did. When I finally came around to this film, after watching and feeling ambivalent about Avatar: The Way of Water, I still find myself with a remarkable sense of indifference for the world of Pandora, the Na’vi and the man behind them all.
I respect James Cameron for his scope and scale. Watching his films like Titanic fill me with a sense of adirmation for the sheer size of the works. He puts an insane amount of effort into the details, graphics, emotions and feelings of the story worlds he crafts. And yet, I feel that these works are nothing more than hollow spectacles with predictable and shallow characters.
For being a grand storyteller, Cameron never seems to have the most complex or thought-provoking ideas in his films. Avatar is no different. You can see that there are hints of a baseline critique of corporations, but Cameron never dares to veer any deeper outside of having a corporate stooge (Giovanni Ribisi) in the film.
Maybe I would feel this way about Star Wars if I hadn’t watched it when I was 4-years old. But at least the original trilogy is an allegory for the Vietnam War. I don’t feel this way at all with Avatar. Don’t get me wrong, I will be excited for Avatar 3 and the sequels beyond. Doesn’t mean I will enjoy them, though.
Summary: On the lush alien world of Pandora live the Na'vi, beings who appear primitive but are highly evolved. Because the planet's environment is poisonous, human/Na'vi hybrids, called Avatars, must link to human minds to allow for free movement on Pandora. Jake Sully (Sam Worthington), a paralyzed former Marine, becomes mobile again through one such Avatar and falls in love with a Na'vi woman (Zoe Saldana). As his bond with her grows, he is drawn into a battle for the survival of her world.