"Avatar" Teaser is Up

The trailer for "Avatar," Jim Cameron's long overdue follow-up to the blockbuster-against-which-all-others-are measured "Titanic", went up online not too long ago. The result is, um, unexpected. This first glimpse of footage isn't yawn-inducing, but for me it is kind of "Huh?"-inducing. Some of that is definitely on-purpose, but there are enough flying dragons ridden by blue archers to raise an eyebrow or two.

While it's nice to see some new non-documentary footage from the mind of Jim Cameron, it's a little dismaying to see that it appears to be cut from a film that's a weird hybrid of "Halo", "Phantom Menace", "Apocalypto" and "Ferngully" (the font for the film is definitely either from "Ferngully" or from the "Yanni: Live at Red Rocks" album). It is a teaser, so it's hard to take a whole lot from it other than the overall setting, the look of some of the alien environments, and a sense of the scope, but that's about it.

What is clear is that we've got Sam Worthington in what looks like a starring role. That's promising. He was the best thing about "T4" so I like the odds that he'll do an excellent job in this film, provided, that is, Cameron gives him some room to act as himself, and not in the form of one of the small-headed, spotted blue man-things that seem to be the focus of the movie.

From what I've heard, this film is one of those projects that directors sometimes pull from out of the back of a closet when they realize they can literally make any damn movie they want. "Fifth Element" was like that. I think the Star Wars prequels were basically like that. So that's cause for worry, but this is Little Jimmy Cameron we're talking about, the guy who made "Aliens" and "Terminator 2" and "The Abyss". It's difficult to imagine we'll see a bad movie from him.

But this teaser does make it slightly less difficult.