Avatar: The Way of Water | 16 DEC 2022 | Don't worry guys, critics like it

[Eric is Quiet]

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Please don't spoil what's in the Way of Water post-credits footage. It's not fair to people who haven't/won't be able to see it.

[upriser7]

Watched the re-released version today in IMAX 3D. I haven't watched the movie since its original release..I really enjoyed today's experience. It was a beautiful movie both emotionally and visually.

 

Avatar's Way of Water footage shown in the post credits scene looked amazing visually. Those under the water visuals were something else..never seen anything like that. I don't know much about technical stuff but this footage just looked and felt really different than anything I have seen so far

Edited September 23, 2022 by upriser7

[lorddemaxus]

45 minutes ago, IronJimbo said:

 

IT WAS AMAZING. Honestly If you haven't seen Avatar in 3D you haven't seen Avatar.

 

 

That post credit scene means you missed out on the HFR

[Stewart]

Alright got back from primetime showing in IMAX 3D. Lot's of feedback! I'll try and be objective where possible.

 

So, to begin, the screen was about half full in the end. Which is a good opening for a normal release, and this is a re-release no less. 

 

When the BBFC rating card appeared and it said "Avatar (2022)" there was noticeable discussion, I also heard the people near me say "Why does it say 2022 when it came out like 20 years ago". Despite the fact that it's not that old, it means people associate this with nostalgia, and also that many of the people there did not know it was remastered. 

 

The IMAX screen was noticeably brighter too. When the Avatar 2 trailer came on beforehand it was noticeably brighter than when I'd seen it before, really made a difference. 

 

Regarding remastering, I have watched Avatar many times at home (most recently last year), and yet I could not notice it was remastered. Not sure what they did, but it didn't look any different to how I remembered it.

 

Notable scenes from A1 which still pack a massive punch visually and thematically:

1. Climbing up the mountains leading to Jake's first flight, that still hits beautifully
2. Destruction of Hometree still looks amazing, a great spectacle and the detailing on the tree as it falls is brilliant
3. Grace's death, with Jake's speech and the gathering of the clans - this whole montage is just great to watch on a big screen
4. Ewya has heard you, that line still packs emotion even after so many watches

The CGI still holds up great, I did notice some clunky movements at times, but it's noticeably better than most CGI you see today still. In particular, the water scenes in A1 actually look pretty damn good, I didn't remember how good they looked. 

 

Personally, I always try and watch in 3D if I can, but it really didn't bother me much this time. It's a trade off, and I heard others muttering afterwards too, the 3D hurts peoples eyes, and the glasses are not that comfortable, but the level of immersion is much greater. You feel part of the film, not watching it. I did notice some annoying clunks in the 3D though, for example some "flat" computer screens had depth applied to them, and some printed photos had depth applied to them. This was offputting since you would not expect those to have depth; a post-prod blunder I suspect. 

 

Now, onto the midcredits scene. 

 

Non-spoilerly stuff:

When it came on, people started coming back in and sitting at the front to watch it. The room fell silent, and for a solid two and a half minutes, the jaws of almost everybody in the room just dropped. Including mine. The realism and world building is absolutely phenomenal, like literally nothing you have ever seen before. But even better, it doesn't feel like a documentary - it feels like a cinematic, yet incredibly realistic, world. After it finished, there was lots and lots of chatter, more than after the film itself! I waited till the very end when the credits finished (there was nothing else extra) and another group which remained wanted to come back and watch it again tomorrow - not Avatar, but the 2.5 minute scene from A2! 

 

Spoilery stuff for A2:

Spoiler

The scene I had was a group of girls and a group of boys swimming underwater. Very subtle background music, and the first 2 minutes was almost no sound at all, you just immediately fell in love with the visuals. The detail in the creatures and foliage is just something you've never seen before - even in A1. It really was phenomenal to watch and just observe. There was some brief conversations and chatter between the kids towards the end, generally seemed natural and good. 

 

Honestly, I think people will be raving so much about the A2 scene that it could drive legs into A1's rerelease as WOM spreads. It just transports to such a fantastical world that you can't help but want more of it. If the response from what I've seen is representative of the whole A2 movie, then wow, Cameron's done it again. 

 

TL;DR;

I was ever so slightly disappointed in A1, because the remaster wasn't as noticeable as I would've liked. Then the A2 scene came along and minds were blown out of the water.

[Eric is Quiet]

 

[robertman2]

1 minute ago, Eric from Progressive said:

 

the leftism in my body leaving when i see cool big robots

[Stewart]

16 minutes ago, Stewart said:

Alright got back from primetime showing in IMAX 3D. Lot's of feedback! I'll try and be objective where possible.

 

So, to begin, the screen was about half full in the end. Which is a good opening for a normal release, and this is a re-release no less. 

...

Oh something I forgot to mention: very few walkups surprisingly. The number of people in the cinema was about the same as the number of bookings when I checked at lunchtime today. Maybe tomorrow will go better for walkups.

[Gavin Feng]

 

Quote

What’s Cameron’s secret of success? “I don’t know,” says the man whose films have made a combined $6 billion plus. “I don’t make any decisions on movies thinking, ‘That will be worth an extra $5 million.’ You just follow your nose as a storyteller — you can’t deconstruct the gross.

“That said, when I sat down with my writers to start Avatar 2, I said we cannot do the next one until we understand why the first one did so well. We must crack the code of what the hell happened.”

What were his conclusions? “Well, all films work on different levels. The first is surface, which is character, problem and resolution. The second is thematic. What is the movie trying to say? But Avatar also works on a third level, the subconscious.” This explains, Cameron says, why so many people saw the original more than once. “I wrote an entire script for the sequel, read it and realised that it did not get to level three. Boom. Start over. That took a year.”

 

https://archive.ph/vPfJ2#selection-1913.0-1929.265

[interiorgatordecorator]

what I find interesting is that 3/6 of the cinema chains in my city are only offering the re-release in 2d, my local theater would have offered it in 3D but they didnt get the 3d glasses in time

 

 

Edited September 23, 2022 by interiorgatordecorator

[Alexdube]

Curious is it possible that a showing is HFR but not specified? Or is it generally mentioned?

[TheDude391]

4 hours ago, Alexdube said:

Curious is it possible that a showing is HFR but not specified? Or is it generally mentioned?

My theatre didn't mention it on their site, even told me it was 24fps when I called to check...it was indeed HFR. Their IMAX projector is single laser. Seems its the dual laser that can't do it.

 

Edited September 24, 2022 by TheDude391

[TheDude391]

I never saw this in theatres back in '09 and yeah this really is a totally different film on the BIG screen. The 3d is amazing, and the sound design is unreal, it's overwhelmingly immersive.

 

It's embarrassing how much better this looks than every blockbuster that's come out in the 13 years since. And then you see the Avatar 2 scene and it's 10x better, genuinely looked photo real! HFR was good, used way more sparingly than expected. Only lasts a few seconds at a time to cover the really fast moments but wasn't jarring. A2 uses it more which makes sense since it was shot native and it looked amazing.

 

I haven't stopped thinking about the A2 preview since seeing it hours ago, actually broke my brain. I am confident this film out grosses the original now.

[IronJimbo]

1 hour ago, TheDude391 said:

I never saw this in theatres back in '09 and yeah this really is a totally different film on the BIG screen. The 3d is amazing, and the sound design is unreal, it's overwhelmingly immersive.

 

It's embarrassing how much better this looks than every blockbuster that's come out in the 13 years since. And then you see the Avatar 2 scene and it's 10x better, genuinely looked photo real! HFR was good, used way more sparingly than expected. Only lasts a few seconds at a time to cover the really fast moments but wasn't jarring. A2 uses it more which makes sense since it was shot native and it looked amazing.

 

I haven't stopped thinking about the A2 preview since seeing it hours ago, actually broke my brain. I am confident this film out grosses the original now.

 

Welcome to Jimboland

 

IM EXPECTING SOME APOLOGIES FOLKS

Edited September 24, 2022 by IronJimbo

[THUNDER BIRD]

Watched Avatar in 3D and even in Normal 3D it looked stunning, better than modern blockbusters and i actually enjoyed it more than when i watched it first time on TV 10 years back.

 

Obviously theater experience adds a detail in visuals and sound that can't be matched in tv, but it's not just that thing, i genuinely was more invested in storytelling and characters than before.

 

Wasn't bored for a second and the movie was really hype by the time climax happens..... Whole theater went ballistic when Jake gave his speech and rallied the People for the war.

 

Final Battle was awesome too, i forgot how action packed and powerful it was, especially Eywa has heard you scene.

 

I haven't watched the movie for years and i guess it is better this way if you haven't watched the movie in long time.

 

Also Avatar 2 Footage was incredible. You just need to experience it.

[Alexdube]

5 hours ago, TheDude391 said:

My theatre didn't mention it on their site, even told me it was 24fps when I called to check...it was indeed HFR. Their IMAX projector is single laser. Seems its the dual laser that can't do it.

 

which Avatar 2 scene did you get? @lorddemaxus seem to suggest if you get the whale scene it isn't HFR?

I did get the whale scene, but it seemed to me like the framerate was dialed up in a few places  

 

[Deuce66]

14 hours ago, Gavin Feng said:

 

 

https://archive.ph/vPfJ2#selection-1913.0-1929.265

 

Pretty sure that first attempt at the sequel = Avatar The High Ground series of graphic novels. Volume 1 comes out Oct 25.

 

ABOUT AVATAR: THE HIGH GROUND VOLUME 1

It has been over a decade since the humans were forced to leave Pandora—but now they’re returning—with an armada of heavily-armed starships!

After years of peace, Jake Sully has settled down with Neytiri and raised a family, so for him, the stakes are even higher than when he first went to war against the corporate might of the RDA.

During the development process of creating the four Avatar sequels, a lot of new ideas and stories were created and discussed. One such EPIC original story idea that didn’t make it into the sequels was James Cameron’s original story—“The High Ground.” Cameron shared what he had written with Dark Horse Comics and it is now being adapted by award-winning author Sherri L. Smith (The Toymaker’s Apprentice, Orleans), and illustrated by Brazilian artist Guilherme Balbi.

 

[GOGODanca]

https://twitter.com/meJat32/status/1573648336389025792?s=20&t=Nuugs5hkfFv-68JIh8tv6w

[Deuce66]

Good start for Avatar, Saturday pre-sales in my area are higher than yesterday. $10-12 million for the Domestic weekend? 

 

 

 

[XXR & Friends]

16 minutes ago, Deuce66 said:

Good start for Avatar, Saturday pre-sales in my area are higher than yesterday. $10-12 million for the Domestic weekend? 

 

 

 

 

$8.8-9.3M

 

[TheDude391]

5 hours ago, Alexdube said:

which Avatar 2 scene did you get? @lorddemaxus seem to suggest if you get the whale scene it isn't HFR?

I did get the whale scene, but it seemed to me like the framerate was dialed up in a few places  

 

I got the whale too and it was HFR 100%. I’ve spoken to people who got non HFR and also got the whale so. Dependant on format/chain/country…who knows?