Reel Time Updates: The Last Airbender

Saturday night saw me and a gaggle of mis compañeros at our local cinema for a 9:50pm viewing of M. Night Shyamalan’s The Last Airbender in 2D. (I’d heard reports that many theater-goers had been able to [clearly] view a good chunk of the 3D version sans glasses, so that was out.) Also, I didn’t want to pay an inflated ticket price for a film that was receiving such lousy reviews.

I did attempt to purchase a student admission, but was informed that, “We don’t do student admissions on weekends.” What, so if it’s not a normal school-day, I’m not a student? The only period of my academic career when I got weekends off were grades K-3 in private school. After that, between home-schooling and higher education online, any attempts to take weekends off resulted in projects getting turned in late. And what are students on the weekends if they’re not students? Delinquent dropouts? All that being said, I’m technically not attending school right now anyway, but it’s the principle of the matter.

The Trailers: For some reason, it seems that less trailers were played before this film than most of the others I’ve seen this year. I remember seeing: Gulliver’s Travels (good for some cheap laughs, but otherwise a waste of time); Rango (I think this film looks like it could be good/interesting. I’d seen the trailer, but, as always, bigger is better); Green Hornet (the action looks good, but I’m still not buying Seth Rogen as the Hornet); and Megamind (it’s about time for a new trailer. This film still has five months before release).

My Take on The Last Airbender: Okay, so several people are threatening to publicly disown me because I went and saw this, but… guys… it’s on my Top Ten list! (Yes, that means I had to go see it.) While I respect and value the reviews of my fellow cinephiles, I simply cannot base my opinions on their opinions. Especially if it’s a film I’ve been wanting to check out. The same for the vice versa: if it’s a film I don’t think looks all that great, I usually won’t go and see it just because everyone is raving about it (e.g., The Hangover, Paranormal Activity, Splice).

But in any case, while there was quite a bit of chatter going on during the film, I managed to take most of it in, and while it was lacking in quite a few areas, I still enjoyed it and may actually give it a second viewing when it hits the “cheap theater”. (Those folks who want to publicly disown me have just upgraded my status to “lynch in a back alley… it’s for your own good”.)

In order to appreciate Shyamalan’s films, I’ve found that it’s best to view them as works of modern art. You know, like those weird pieces you see in museums with blobs of paint on an enormous canvas, or an awkward, toddler-quality line drawn across a piece of plywood.

While some may look at this and say, “This is crap. Anyone can splash paint on a board,” others will find meaning in the work, or will appreciate what the artist was envisioning when they created it. When watching Shyamalan films, I try to do so from the standpoint of the latter group. This makes the film more enjoyable (or more bearable), and I find myself spotting some of the really neat perspectives and camera angles Shyamalan uses.

Now, that viewpoint does not apply as much to The Last Airbender as it has for Shyamalan’s other films because this is the first movie the oft-bashed filmmaker cannot claim to be an original work. It’s based on a very well-written, much-loved Nickelodeon cartoon series, so there was a built-in and very rabid possessive loyal fan base that the writer/director was having to cater to (yes, I have seen and am a fan of the series).

I have automatic sympathy for anyone associated with a reboot or adaptation, because the same fan base that will guarantee ticket sales will also guarantee outlandish expectations. It was silly for anyone to expect this film to be as great as the series. The series was epic, and you simply cannot condense 8+ hours and of epicness (the first season, aka “The Water Book”) into 2 hours and expect it to be just as good (or even comparable, apparently).

The best thing about the film was probably the visuals, and that includes CGI, sets, scenery and costumes. Most of the costumes were close, if not spot-on. While a lot of the hairstyles were off, it’s ridiculous to expect animé hair to translate perfectly into real-life ‘dos (see: Dragonball). While we often got only fleeting glances of a lot of locations included in the film, they were fairly accurate and aesthetic.

The worst thing about the film was the pronunciation of certain names, places and terms. I can’t believe the series’ creators (who purportedly worked with Shyamalan) allowed some of the changes he made in this area. Name pronunciation is a tabula rasa when translating from book to film, because readers have never actually heard how a particular name is pronounced. When they hear it differently than they had been pronouncing it in their mind, there’s the initial annoyance/shock, but then they think, “Okay, I had it wrong all this time,” and move on (see: Hermione). However, when viewers have already been audibly exposed to a particular pronunciation for three entire seasons of a TV series, trying to switch that up is a no-no. Sorry, Shyamalan, but… epic fail.

Probably the most oft-mocked of these was the name of the titular protagonist: Aang. In the series, the name was pronounced AING (rhymes with “slang”), but in the movie, characters pronounced it ONG (rhymes with “long”). Sometimes it even came out as UNG. By about halfway through the film, our entire row (as well as the row behind us) would, in unison (and correctly), chime, “Aang!” every time a character mispronounced the name (which was every single time it was mentioned). Needless to say, said occurrence would be great for a drinking game.

Other than that, the bending was pretty awesome (all though there wasn’t enough of it, and the pre-bending warm-ups were way too long), Sokka (pronounced SOCK-UH, not SOAK-UH!) was not very funny, there wasn’t enough meaningful dialogue, the plot was a poorly-sewn patchwork of the series’ first season, and pretty much the entire Fire Nation (except Dev Patel’s Zuko, why’d they decide to pronounce this one right?) was miscast.

As usual, I understand why this film is taking such a beating. For all intents and purposes, it royally sucked, but I like to try and look at the glass as half full, and there are films that I’ve walked away from feeling much, much worse. Shyamalan, I’m still a fan and it may not be your destiny to remain involved with this project, but I really hope the other two films get made. It would suck if The Last Airbender turned out to be another Eragon or The Golden Compass. C’mon, Paramount/Nickelodeon: yip-yip!