Avatar: The Way Of Water Film Review

This is it we are now just a little under a week away before the release of the latest Avatar movie with the film being one that is going to be winning at the box office when it comes out THIS Friday. As such it was only about right that for the tie in review that I go back and take a look at the film that took the VFX world by storm to see if it's as good as it was back in 2022 and so then join me as I review the film that has alot of really jaw dropping effects in it with the film in question being called simply just "Avatar: The Way of Water" enjoy.

The plot of this film is sixteen years after the events of the first film Jake and his family find themselves being hunted when humans return to Pandora and have to do everything that they can do to protect there family. Now then interms of what I personally thought / felt about the actual plot that's actually featured / presented to us in this very film well then in all honesty I in all honesty personally thought / felt that the actual plot that's actually featured / presented to us in this very film was in all honesty really good with the plot of this film being one that that whilst it's not as good as the plot of the first film was is still really good in it's own right as the plot allows you to fully breathe in this world and just to take in all of it's sights and sounds something which does add to the films plot as it helps to make this world feel more real however tho this film does tread on alot of the same ground as the first one even doing to using the same main villain with this films plot being a good example of that as much like the first film Jake has to be accepted into a new tribe of Na'vi in order to survive and while that seemed fresh and new in the first film here it felt more tired and played out with the films plot not really being the strongest plot out there as the film does drop it's plot alot of the time so much so that you'd be forgiven for wondering just what the plot of the film is even meant to be in the first place and granted that was also a problem with the first film here it was a little bit more obvious as there are huge portions of the film where nothing happens to advance the films overall plot with the plot of the film also being really rather entertaining and as well as being really rather engaging as well in my freaking opinions anyways / at least.

Starring in this film is Sam Worthington as Jake Sully , Zoe Saldaña as Neytiri Te Tskaha Mo'at'ite and Sigourney Weaver as Kiri Te Suli Kireysi'ite and Dr. Grace Augustine. Also starring in this film is Stephen Lang as Colonel Miles Quaritch , Kate Winslet as Ronal , Cliff Curtis as Tonowari , Joel David Moore as Dr. Norm Spellman , CCH Pounder as Mo'at , Edie Falco as General Frances Ardmore , Brendan Cowell as Captain Mick Scoresby , Jemaine Clement as Dr. Ian Garvin , Jamie Flatters as Neteyam Te Suli Tsyeyk'itan , Britain Dalton as Lo'ak Te Suli Tsyeyk'itan , Trinity Bliss as Tuktirey "Tuk" Te Suli Neytiri'ite , Jack Champion as Miles "Spider" Socorro , Bailey Bass as Tsireya , Filip Geljo as Aonung , Duane Evans Jr. as Rotxo , Dileep Rao as Dr. Max Patel , Matt Gerald as Corporal Lyle Wainfleet and Giovanni Ribisi as Parker Selfridge.

Now then interms of what I personally thought / felt about the actual CGI that's actually featured / presented to us in this very film well then in all honesty I in all honesty personally thought / felt that the actual acting that's actually featured / presented to us in this very film was in all honesty really good. With the fact that this films acting being as good as it is not really being all that surprising as alot of this films actor are not only reprising their roles from the previous film but are also a bunch of really good actors in their own right and those that aren't reprising their roles are all mostly really good actors as well with this film perfectly casting all of it's new characters as even tho there hidden behind a bunch of pixels you can still see human emotion coming through all of the characters with this being something that really does help to buy into this films performances as even tho this film did put alot of effort into it's effects you can tell that just as much thought and effort was out into it's acting and as a result of that is the fact that we get some really good performances from all of this films actors and not just the actors that you expect a great performance from with this films best actor being Sigourney Weaver as Kiri Te Suli Kireysi'ite and Dr. Grace Augustine as she does make for a convincing fourteen year old who is trying to figure out how she has this connection to this worlds version of God and yet she's really still just a kid with Sigourney being so really good in the role of Kiri that you forget that she's really more closer seventy then sixty as she's really just that good in both roles in this film with the acting that's in this film really being helped by the fact that this is films script is just so good that all this films actors have to do is just say the lines as they are written and a good performance will come out of them naturally which is something that really does help to raise the overall quality of the acting that's in this very film.

Doing the CGI for this film is the legends and the greats that are currently over at Weta FX , Industrial Light & Magic and New Entity Pictures. Now then interms of what I personally thought / felt about the actual CGI that's actually featured / presented to us in this very film was in all honesty so freaking good. It really doesn't need to be said just how good that this films effects are as it's been said by alot of people just how good that the effects in this film truly are and yeah every one of those people are correct as this films VFX are truly breath taking to look at so much so that there's barely a frame of live action footage in this film outside of the scenes where you can see the human characters and even then the backgrounds are CGI with the best trick that this film played on us was making us believe that the water was real as both fire and water and the hardest things to do in CGI as they act differently each time and yet thia film pulled of this task effortlessly with the the fully CGI characters interacting with the water and the water is behaving like it would do in real life this is because of the fact that the effects teams that worked on this film took along time just in developing the technology needed for this film with them coming up with various ways to get the shots needed for this film and it is something that does pay off as after a while you forget that your watching a computer effect and you start seeing the characters with even the characters being done by motion capture something which did help to make this films water effects feel more real as the films actors were actually in a purpose built tank of water for a lot of this films shoot with this film more then raising the bar when it comes to high quality visual effects.

There was at the very least two plot lines that didn't get wrapped up in this film and to be frank that's a good thong. As they the fact that Kiri doesn't know who her birth father is and the fact that she doesn't know why she has this connection to this worlds God and this is a great as it makes what could have been seen as a small plot that will go nowhere now seem all the more bigger with both plot threads being somethin that very easily could be picked up and even expanded upon or wrapped in Fire And Ash as for all we could know Kiri has this connection to this god like being because of the fact that she is meant to be the second coming of that god which granted does seem a little bit out there but it would also explain why Grace's Avatar body was pregnant with Kiri like maybe Kiri is meant to be Avatars version of mother nature which is something that would make alot of sense given what we see with her character in this film with the only thing that would be hard to explain was who her father is as you can't make it Quaritch as fun and interesting as that would be as the characters human body was killed of at the end of the first film and you can't really make it any of the other human characters as not alot of them had Avatars of their own to begin with which means that her father is he was alive would have to be one of the Na'Vi as she is meant to be fully Na'Vi despite the fact that Grace was a human as it was her Avatar that was pregnant and not Grace's human body but either way it would be interesting to see just where the film goes with either of those two plot lines as they both do have the potential to be something jaw dropping and to this films credit it does devote alot of time just in setting up both of those plots.

Just going back to this film copying what the first film did this film does also spend alot of time with the characters just getting used to there new setting. However instead of Jake getting used to living in the forest and being a Na'vi now he and his family are getting used to living with a tribe of Na'vi that live near the water and much like the first film where Jakes must learn to fly a bird something which comes into play in the films third act here the characters learn to ride a sea creature which once again comes into play in the third act and while it is great that we get to see more of Pandora both on the land and underneath it that doesn't mean that the makers of this film had to just copy what the first film did only this time they added a few new things and that's it as that just makes them look lazy even tho it is understandable why these characters who lived in the forest have no idea about these creatures of the sea and so they would of course have to learn that there surely had to be a better way of doing it over then just redo what the first film did that's not to say that it's a bad idea as it's not due to the fact that we get to see the characters bonding with the inhabitants of this new tribe with some of them even beginning to fall in love with one another which yes granted could also be seen as being a copy of Jake and Neytiri falling in love with each other as well however it is something that does give us a chance to see just how Jake interacts with his kids as well as we get to see that he pretty much favors his eldest son Neteyam so much so that it does end up driving a wedge between Neteyam and Jakes youngest son Lo'ak who just wants his fathers approval with those scenes being played out in the scenes where we get to see the characters learning these things that will ultimately save them in the films thrilling third act. 

To give his film some credit Quaritch is a pretty decent villain in this film as he's basically insane and is willing to kill any Na'vi because of his blind hatred of them. With the film doing something quite interesting which is they give him a son that was raised by Jake and Neytiri so much so that he sees himself as being one of them with him even befriending there children and being childhood friends with them with this being something that Quaritch doesn't really know about or even suspect to be the case in this film as she just knows that that's his son and that's it and while the film doesn't really delve into that aspect of the character it is something that could be delved into in the next film as now it forces him to question on if what he's doing is truly right or not as it comes to this film the fact that he doesn't really have a plan outside of getting revenge on Jake and Neytiri is something that does oddly work for this film as this is the kind of character that would go off hunting them down even tho he was given orders to kill them he was given cart blanch to go about it just however he wants and in true style he does go about the most villainous way possible with this being one of the few areas where this film does outshine the previous film as while Quaritch was done really well in the first film he was the main villain really only for the films third act thus not giving him that much time to shine as a character where as here he gets much more time to show us just how evil of a character that he really is with him even threatening to kill Kiri just to get to Jake which is a truly evil thing and to the films credit they do do something interesting with that by having Neytiri flip the script by having her threaten his son as a way to save her own daughter.

Now then this film has / had an exact grand total running time of exactly three hours and twelve minuets and thirty eight seconds. Which even for an Avatar film where the films typically have longer running times this one does feel a bit more longer then what it really needed to be as alot of it is just setting things up with them not really paying off that much with the film having the right amount of plot there to really cover that amount of running time as this is a film that really doesn't need to be as long as it was as you very easily could have tole this films plot in two hours as alot of this film is spent just of setting things up for the third film when it really should have been more focused on telling a good story in it's own right with this film not really using it's running time all that wisely as the film doesn't fully develop all that well as the film spends more time in showing off it's effects then giving us a more thought out story with this fil not even taking the time that it really needed to fully develop it's characters either which is fine for the returning characters as it could be argued that they got there character in the previous film but it is something that could be a huge issue as film doesn't develop any of it's new characters now there is a good chance that those characters could get there development in the next film but it is something that needed to be done in this film as that would make them all that more developed in the next film and yet we get to find out nothing about them in this film as we know as much about these new characters coming out of the film then we did coming into the film but I really will admit that this film really does have some really good pacing to it tho.

So now then as this is an action film that really does mean that I gave to actually talk about the actual action that's actually featured / presented to us in this very film well then in all honesty I in all honesty personally thought / felt that the actual action that's actually featured / presented to us in this very film was in all honesty really good. With this film having alot of really good action in it which is something that would have been a hard task to do as the first film also had some really good action in it as well and yet this film managed to top what the first film did from an action point of view due to the fact that this film did have that longer running time and therefor could spend alot more time in pacing things out and in letting us breathe in those action scenes with the films best action scene being the films third act as that's where we get ton see everything that's been built up in the film come to a head with the film even going the extra mile in killing one of Jake and Neytiri's sons in this case Neteyam which then leads to Neytiri going nuts on every human that she sees as it was one of them that did hire the bullet that killed her son and yet it doesn't stop there as her daughters also get kidnapped and the boat that there own starts to capsize all the while Jake is fighting Quaritch and while he can't kill him as he originally wanted to Jake is able to knock him out cold all the while Neytiri and Tuk or stuck on the boat unable to find away out and are only rescued when Kiri finds them with this films third act just being so thrilling that the film really is worth watching just for it's action scenes alone as all of the films action scenes are just that good in my freaking opinions anyways / at least. 

Overall while Fire And Ash very well could be the film of the year this film is one that despite it's lack of a strong plot is still a really good film in it's own and even the film does feel like it's just showing off it's VFX alot of the time when the effects are this good you might as well show them off with this film being one that whilst it's not as good as the first film is still a really good film in it's own right in my freaking opinions anyways / at least. Now then i've talked about all of the good and as well as all of the bad things that are in this very film in this very revue and as such that really does mean that this film really does earn itself a grand old score of exactly a 7.5 out of 10 from me.

Now then as for where I personally got all of the images that I personally used in this very review well then boys and girls and as well as ladies and gentlemen I personally got all of the images that I personally used in this very review from IMP Awards . Com and Google Images. With my personally preferred website to use to get images really from this very film being the really great Google Images this is really because of the fact that really all of the images that I really indeed got and really used from Google Images are all really high quality really with all of the images that really are all and of course really currently up and on the really great and the really solid Google Images really are all being really fairly high in quality and as well as them all really being fairly high in definition.