Avatar 3D (12A)
***** 
James Cameron (Writer and Director)
www.avatarmovie.com

With the much talked-about budget in the region of $300 million dollars and at 161 minutes in length Avatar 3D is clearly epic in its aspirations. So, in order to prepare for this cinematic odessey, I thought it best to refamiliarise myself with some of James Cameron's earlier work and revisited Aliens and Titanic. Aliens is a favourite movie of mine and I think I'm probably alone in the world by saying I don't like Titanic but I wanted a sense of balance and a big budget vehicle to judge Avatar by. Where Aliens has a taut storyline and superb alien special effects, Titanic still seems to wallow in unecessary self-indulgence to the detriment of the cast and plot, something I've always found distasteful considering the horrific tragedy that the real Titanic was. So, would Avatar 3D be an Aliens or a Titanic?

By the time we were due to see Avatar 3D, two things had happened. One, people were talking about it being 'Dances with Wolves' but with 'nine foot smurfs' and two, half a foot of snow fell followed by a whole load of freezing weather. So, digging out the drive to try and get to the cinema on time for our pre-booked tickets, while making sure we had necessary provisions should we get stuck in a snowdrift did seem slightly OTT just for a film. This is the first time I've ever taken flasks, blankets, wellingtons and a shovel with me to the cinema and so the movie didn't just have to live up to all the marketing hype but be worth all the effort expended to get there as well.

The central character is Jake Sully (Sam Worthington), a former Marine, now in a wheelchair who, after the death of his twin brother, is recruited to the Avatar Program on the distant planet of Pandora. Here he is to become an Avatar controller in order to help persuade the Na'vi, the indigenous population, to leave their forest dwelling and allow the mining of a precious mineral needed back on earth. What follows is a story woven around the good guys, Jake and the Avatar science team befriending the Na'vi and battling against the inexorable, faceless corporate machine, rapacious for the precious mineral and prepared to destroy the forest and all who dwell in it to get it.

The plot is solid enough and though it may meander slowly through the first half, it is easy to become totally engrossed in the superb visualisation of Pandora. A whole new planet's ecosystem has been created to make the depth and detail afforded by 3D a real treat. The second half of the movie gains momentum with epic battle scenes and a love story crossing boundaries of culture, species and technology. The cast is great, headed up ably by a cigarette smoking Sigourney Weaver and featuring among others Wes Studi, Michelle Rodriguez, Stephen Lang and Zoe Saldana. It is clearly aimed at the teen eco-warrior/gaming market but certainly as a family movie (ages ranging from 9 up) this is without doubt a Christmas treat. As to whether it's another Aliens or Titanic I shall sum it up, in the words of our eleven year old ...'It has love, courage, cowardice...and weapons!'

2012 (12A)
*****
Columbia Pictures
http://www.whowillsurvive2012.com/

Roland Emmerich's (Stargate, Independence Day, The Day After Tomorrow) latest movie, 2012 is on a global scale. The premise is simple, in the year 2012 there will be a solar flare of such magnitude it will rip apart the world as we know it. The story follows various individuals trying to survive this event and interweaves their destinies along the way. There are vague references to Mayan calandars and Dan Brown-style conspiracies but these are really red herrings for what is simply a good old fashioned disaster movie.
In order to achieve the astounding special effects, the Yellowstone caldera exploding, cities collapsing, earthquakes and tidal waves, computer generated imagery is seamlessly integrated with live action and hats off the the actors for making it feel believable. The cast is headed up by John Cusack (Grosse Pointe Blank, High Fidelity, War Inc.) who plays an everyman by the name of Jackson Curtis, a  little known author (http://www.farewellatlantis.com) just trying to keep his dysfunctional family alive. Chitwetel Ejiofor plays the government geologist with a conscience and the rest of the cast include Amanda Peet, Oliver Platt, Thandie Newton, Danny Glover and Woody Harrelson (Woody Harrelson manages to salvage his over-the-top acting of a conspiracy theorist DJ by the seat of his pants).

While the science bits are well and truly dodgy, so numerously dodgy that I'm not even going to go there, the fast-paced action is right on track and the 158 minutes fly by in jaw-droppingly spectacular style. This is a movie that needs a big screen and suggest you see it at a cinema while you can. If you liked 'The Day After Tomorrow' then 2012 is it's bigger and eye-poppingly bolder brother.

Fantastic Mr. Fox (PG)
Regency Enterprises/Indian Paintbox
20th Century Fox
http://www.fantasticmrfoxmovie.com
*****

UP 3D (U)
Disney/Pixar
http://adisney.go.com/disneyvideos/animatedfilms/up/
*****

It is interesting to compare the two big animated films of this autumn, Fantastic Mr. Fox and UP 3D. While Disney Pixar's UP reaches for the sky with digital 3D dioramas of breathtaking beauty inhabited with the now familiar hyper-caricature3D cartoons, Wes Anderson's (The Royal Tenenbaums) Fantastic Mr. Fox opts for more traditional stop-motion animation, where models are photographed, moved, then photographed again to painstakingly build up a sequence of animation. Both movies have opted for quirky, low-key storylines which have added appeal to adult audiences and add sophistication to the genre.

UP 3D, written and directed by Pete Doctor (Wall-E) and Bob Peterson follows the adventures of a pensioner, Carl Fredricksen (Ed Asner), trying to deal with old age and the loss of his wife by fulfilling a long-held promise to explore a lost land in South America. He does this by tying a huge amount of helium balloons to his house and a young boy-scout, Russel, manages to tag along too and very soon they are plunged into a dangerous adventure featuring a bird named Kevin, a really bad baddie voiced by Christopher Plummer and a pack of dogs which have all the funniest moments in the movie.

In Fantastic Mr. Fox, George Clooney, Meryl Streep and Bill Murray head up a cast of 'voices' for a storyline based loosely on a Roald Dahl book. Here the Fantastic Mr. Fox outwits three odious baddies while juggling a complicated family life. For me, the stop-frame technique hindered the storytelling in places, but there are plenty of awkward character interactions and 70's motifs to keep Wes Anderson fans happy.