The opening sequence of Up was just fantastic.  Pure cinema, no dialogue, just perfectly composed visual images that poetically summarized the life most of us will have with its ups and downs.  I felt it became a little unfocused in the middle, but like pretty much every Pixar movie in showed an amazing ability to handle complex themes in a manner genuinely accessible to all ages.

I hope you like The Hurt Locker - it's my personal choice for the year, with Basterds a little behind with Moon alongside it.  I've always been keen to see Bigelow return, as I hold her in very high esteem despite a few missteps, and I felt she delivered her best film so far and the best of the year when she did.

I think it's a reasonably safe bet that Avatar will win. I don't think that's a bad thing either, I really enjoyed the film (mainly for the visual effects). Sure it wasn't an original plot but it was well told and I found myself actually caring what happened so I'm fine with that. Besides it's hardly the first film to re-use that kind of story line (Dances with Wolves, The Last Mohican, The Last Samurai, Ferngully, Pocahontas to name just a few). I've been pretty disapointed with films released this year and personally don't think anything has been a stand out classic. The best film I've seen released this year in the UK is Let The Right One In but that was left off the the nomination list last year when it was released in Sweeden.

Let the Right One in was Fantastic.  It's a pity films like that never seem to get the attention they deserve in awards.  The best they can seem to hope for is the US English language remake (currently underway already I believe).

Yeah I don't like the system in the Academy Awards where each non-english speaking country can only submit 1 entry for consideration for the Best Foregin Language Film. I've heard there is an English language re-make of Let The Right One In too, I think it's supposed to be released this year.

I saw Avatar last night and I was really unimpressed. It’s (essentially) a heavy handed and preachy retelling of the story of Pocahontas, that doesn’t bother with creating a decent motive for the antagonist’s actions, and a tacked-on Hollywood ending; with the exception of a couple of characters the acting and dialogue was only adequate, and the directing and cinematography was very beige.

I’m not trying to say that the movie was bad, it was a fairly well paced movie with good special effects and plenty of action; but I would say that outside of the effects categories any awards it wins would be more a statement of weak competition than anything else. There are movies like The Wizard of Oz which were visual spectacles when they were released that people are still interested in 100 years after they’re released; and a movie like Avatar will have a massive box-office, great DVD sales, and get decent TV play for the next handful (5 to 10) years and then be forgotten because it is so unoriginal and has been done so many times (so much better) before.

I've never seen The Hurt Locker, but I've heard it's really good!

To everyone who tries to compare this to Pocahontas, I ask them this.  How does the whole becoming a Na'vi (more generally, becoming one of the native people) fit in with Pocohontas theme and message?  Oh wait, it doesn't.  A lot of people formed opinions about this movie before going in, and were thus blinded to everything that showed otherwise (confirmation bias, for anyone who's taken psychology).

Generally, yes, it's similar to Pocahontas, Dances with Wolves, Heart of Darkness (although less similar in this case), etc.  However, we all know everything can be made to look similar if you back off enough.

Let me ask you this: did any of the aforementioned titles make any connections to today (No, I'm not talking about the whole destroying the earth thing)?  Did any of the aforementioned movies look at anything beyond a single case of imperialism?  Did any of the aforementioned titles focus more on creating a living world and culture that people cared about above all else?  Did any of the aforementioned movies create a scientific, relatable explanation for the native system of beliefs?  Did any of the aforementioned movies have a white man decide to give up his whiteness, and become a native, effectively suggesting that the white man's way of life is inferior?

No, they didn't.  Once you start to consider such things, you start to understand that the ending wasn't "tacked on," the reason why the antagonists and their motives were so generic, etc.

Let me be clear, I don't think this is the best movie ever, but I think it deserves a lot more credit than a lot of people want to give it.

To all those people that love to point out that Avatar has the same play as Dances with Wolves-- who cares?

Really, how many original movies are there out there?  What movies aren't based off another plot?  How many of those are actually good?

Who really cares that one movie borrows heavily from another movie?

I also find it funny that people love to point out how it's the same movie as Dances with Wolves and not Pocahontas which it's closer to.

Still though, who cares?  A good movie is a good movie.

How did I form an opinion ahead of time by avoiding all information about the movie? I didn't watch trailers, didn't read reviews and avoided any discussions about so that I would have a clean experience.

On the note of becomming a member of the tribe:

I never directly said you formed an opinion ahead of time (although, granted, it does come off as implied somewhat).  I was trying to point out that a lot of people see a trailer for a movie with a high budget or commercial success and assume it'll be lacking in the story department.  The trailer itself didn't help much in that regard.  The reason I thought your response seemed similar to that of those type of people was because a lot of your complaints were only issues because you seemingly ignored certain themes and pieces of the story.  That's the kind of thing that you do with confirmation bias.

About John Smith: So guesswork is enough grounds for it being similar, espeically when Smith eventually returns to life in the Western colonies, and eventually in Europe?  That doesn't really address any of the other points I made, either.