So my girlfriend, daughter and I finally went to see "Avatar" this evening. No, we didn't see it in 3D -- I didn't feel like our experience would be greatly enhanced by the technology. At the last 3D movie we saw ("Up")...for the first half-hour (of what seemed like many many half-hours), the effects kind of gave me a migraine. Too much depth perception gives me the spins. One thing I don't need at any movie theater: the spins.

I have to admit that my expectations for this film were low for the simple reason that James Cameron makes crappy movies. His only great films were "Terminator" and "The Abyss". Everything after that has been mildly okay to outright crappy - yes, I'm talking to you, "Titanic." It seems to me he's a guy who has never heard a single thing that's ever come out of anybody's mouth. If he had, he wouldn't write such lame-o dialogue.

Of course a James Cameron movie isn't about dialogue or storytelling. It's about technology & special-effects. His films are basically an Apple iStore splashed across the movie screen. And while I appreciate that he spent a dozen years developing the technology that would allow him to make uber-realistic blue tree people, he might have been better served working on the story, which to my jaundiced eye was just an Emo version of a "cowboys and Indians shoot-em-up".

And as for all the hubbub about the visuals, I couldn't get that geeked about them. The problem might be James Cameron himself. Ever since the Terminator turned into liquid metal in "T2," my attitude about filmmaking has been "Awesome, now we can do anything...so tell me a good story." Special effects should ENHANCE a story, not BE the story. Plus, the Space Smurfs, or Blue Ewoks, or whatever they were, didn't look that spectacular. I never believed they existed: their movements were too herky-jerky and I always felt distracted whenever they cut back to the real people, who looked like...well, real people.

The whole thing was like "Transformers" meets "The Lion King." All in all, it kind of sucked. Not as bad as "Titanic," which might be the highest-grossing worst movie ever made, but it's not that far behind. Life doesn't need to be a technological wonderland. It's a lot more interesting and entertaining when it's just....life. The film might be rated PG-13, but that doesn't mean that it has to operate on the intellectual level of a thirteen year old. Nature is good. Humans are bad. Government is bad. Scientists are good. And technology is a tool best wielded by those who understand its awesome power for good. People like movie directors.