The Avatar Primer
The Avatar Primer: We Plan Your Double-Feature For You
We've been celebrating the occasion across the site this week, with retrospectives on Cameron's career, looks back at advances in movie technology that lead up to Avatar, and even Mack's love letter to the cinematic use of the color blue. But there's one thing we haven't touched on yet, something fundamental to the fanboy experience: the movie marathon. I remember having friends over opening weekend of The Dark Knight to watch Batman Begins on Blu-ray before we all headed to the multiplex to get our minds blown. How many of us rewatched all three original Star Wars
films before lining up for The Phantom Menace, or revisited the classic Trek movies before checking out J.J. Abrams' version?
Of course, Avatar's a brand new universe, so we don't have any way to immerse ourselves in that world prior to having our ticket stub torn. Well, I suppose you could play the video game, but we wouldn't recommend that. Still, just because we don't have any prequels to play with doesn't mean we can't find a few flicks that pair well with Cameron's latest science fiction epic. We know you guys are busy, so we've done the work for you. Here are seven double-feature possibilities to get you stoked for your voyage to Pandora.
Dances With Wolves
This should surprise no one. Everybody (ourselves included) has been making "Dances With Smurfs" jokes ever since the first images from the movie were released. And to hear the early reviews tell it, it's not an unfair comparison. Still, if you're going to crack wise, at least crack wise while well informed. Revisiting Kevin Costner's Oscar-winning 1990 epic will mesh tonally with Cameron's latest outing, plus it will leave you better equipped to be dismissive and petty once the inevitable online backlash against Avatar goes into full swing. It's win-win! It also doesn't hurt that Dances With Wolves is a pretty damn fine film, and Kevin Costner could probably use the residuals these days. Go for the Extended Cut they put out a few years back.
Or You Could Try...: Braveheart. Underdogs fighting against a much more powerful enemy force? Check. Thrilling action setpieces? Check. And hey, Mel Gibson even paints himself blue!
Piranha II: The Spawning
Everybody's got to start somewhere. For James Cameron, that somewhere was the 1981 flick Piranha II: The Spawning, his feature directorial debut. I'll be honest, I've never seen it, so we can all go on this journey together. But while I may not know much about Piranha 2: The Spawning, everything I need to know about it is summed up in that picture above. Flying piranhas, people! Flying. Freaking. Piranhas. Until somebody makes a movie about skateboarding grizzly bears with chainsaw hands, it's hard to get more awesome than flying piranhas. Pairing P2 with Avatar will perfectly bookend Cameron's career, letting you appreciate the artistry that went into the latter while getting a kick out of the sheer corniness of the former. Plus, for all you creative types out there, I dare you not to come away from this double-feature feeling inspired. Like I said, everybody's got to start somewhere, and I'm betting that latest draft of your novel or short film you thought was irredeemable crap will look a lot less dire in the cold light of Piranha 2: The Spawning. The DVD is out of print, but you shouldn't have too much trouble tracking down a rental.
Or You Could Try...: Battle Beyond the Stars. A young James Cameron worked on the special effects for this flick that came out the year before P2, and while it doesn't have flying piranhas, it does have The A-Team's George Peppard playing a Space Cowboy.
The Abyss
Still my favorite Cameron flick of all time, The Abyss is the underdog when it comes to his oeuvre, too often overshadowed by your Terminators and your Aliens. Aside from personal preference, it also pairs better with Avatar than any of his other films (excepting perhaps the aforementioned Piranha 2: The Spawning). Like Avatar, The Abyss is focused on the conflict that arises when humanity starts trying to exploit the home turf of strange creatures who are just trying to mind their own business. Like Avatar, The Abyss was at the forefront of advancing technology at the time -- remember the water tentacle? Like Avatar, The Abyss shares Cameron's focus on average, blue-collar folks just trying to do a job who get swept up in larger events -- in Avatar, they're soldiers, whereas The Abyss gave us undersea oil workers. All that being said, I dare Avatar to give me a villain anywhere near as fun as Michael Biehn's unhinged Lt. Coffey. It's still not out on Blu-ray, so make sure to get the director's cut, featuring a vastly superior ending to the theatrical cut.
Or You Could Try...: Aliens. It's hard to go wrong with Aliens. Before you watch Michelle Rodriguez do her best to channel Vasquez in Avatar, revisit the original. Just don't ask her if she's ever been mistaken for a man.
Star Trek
She's hiding under several layers of azure CGI, but this year's brand-new Uhura model, Zoe Saldana, is playing Neytiri, the main Na'vi that Avatar hero Jake Sully connects with. Between those two movies, the actress' career is likely to blow up in the coming days, so why not take another look at the role that introduced most of us to her this past summer? She was bold enough to embrace the iconic role and take in a new direction, truly making the character her own without disrespecting the classic work of Nichelle Nichols. Plus, this is the second movie in a row where her romantic tastes have extended beyond her own species, and you have to love a girl with some kink in her. Star Trek just hit Blu-ray and DVD a few weeks ago, so this is a perfect excuse to use one science fiction blockbuster to get you stoked for another. Plus, if you dig much deeper into Ms. Saldana's resume, you're just going to run into the likes of Drumline and Center Stage, and nobody wants that.
Or You Could Try...: Terminator Salvation. Sure, it's not a great movie, but for most of us, this was the one that answered the question of "Who the hell is Sam Worthington?" You'll probably see a lot of him in coming days thanks to Avatar and the upcoming Clash of the Titans, but this is where the breakthrough began breaking through. If nothing else, take it as an object lesson in what can happen to a James Cameron movie without James Cameron.
Enemy Mine
Standing proudly alongside The Abyss in the "Underappreciated Genre Movie Hall of Fame" is this buddy tale of a the burgeoning friendship between man and lizard. After space pilot Willis Davidge crash lands on a barren alien world, he goes from trying to kill one of his alien enemies to accepting a begrudging partnership in order to survive. As the years role on, that partnership grows to friendship and a mutual understanding of each other's culture. Like Avatar, Enemy Mine forces its protagonist to come to know his enemy as more than just a target or an opposing force, and to realize that they have far more in common than separating them. I remember watching the hell out of the old VHS copy of this that my dad had, and having revisited it not long ago, it still holds up remarkably well. Featuring great performances from Dennis Quaid as Davidge and Louis Gossett Jr. buried under tons of make-up as "Jerry," Enemy Mine is one of those rare Hollywood sci-fi outings that relies more on character and exploration of human nature than it does on flashy special effects. And I'm not ashamed to admit that I still tear up during at least two scenes, every single time.
Or You Could Try...: The Last Samurai. Me, I'll take Quaid over Cruise any day of the week. Gossett Jr. versus Ken Watanabe? That might be more of a toss-up.
Big
Body-swapping is a major plot point in Avatar, with wheelchair-bound Jake Sully being lured into traveling to Pandora by the prospect of walking again -- albeit in a body not his own (or even his own species). They might seem like a strange pairing at first, but both Avatar and Big ultimately deal with their protagonist's dissatisfaction with his own body, and a misguided belief that changing that body will solve all their problems. Big might get there by way of magic fortune-telling machine rather than test-tubes and DNA splicing, but there's plenty of tonal resonance to make this a great double-feature. Bonus points because it's an entirely different genre and style of movie, but they could feed into each other really well. On a related note, I think it would be awesome to watch a couple of Na'vi have a dance-off on one of those giant keyboards. YouTube, get on that.
Or You Could Try...: Face/Off. Because really, how often do you get to watch a guy with no face smoke a cigarette?
Star Wars, Episode One: The Phantom Menace
Avatar may fall victim to its own hype to some degree. Between Cameron's braggadocio, all the hullaballoo about the visuals, and the return of a legendary director, there's likely no way it can live up to all the expectations. Still, early reviews suggest it is, at worst, an ambitious and entertaining epic despite its inability to turn water into wine or cure your erectile dysfunction simply through the purchase of a ticket. But if you leave the theater feeling a little disappointed, just remember: it could be so much worse.
Or You Could Try...: Anything else. Seriously. Anything.