Title: The Last Airbender (2010)Starring: Noah Ringer, Dev Patel, Nicola Peltz
Directed By: M. Night Shyamalan
This is a prime example of squandered potential. The characters of Nickelodeon's Avatar: The Last Airbender could easily have shone in live action on the big screen, but instead they're all boring cardboard cutouts of themselves spouting mindless drivel for dialogue and performed by woefully miscast wooden actors.
Shyamalan has his defenders and his attackers, and truthfully I am neither. I've enjoyed a few of his films, and I've laughed loudly about how bad some of his others are. That said, I should point out that while I AM very familiar with the original series, I am also not a hardcore fanboy. The series (not unlike the director's filmography) is clunky, flawed, poorly paced and consists of a hodgepodge of ideas from other medium. I liked it though, and compared to this film version, it's brilliant.
The biggest complaint I have about this film, besides the mispronunciation of almost EVERY lead characters' names, is that it never made me care. These people are impossible to relate to. Not a single one of them makes decisions that make sense for their story arc and, more offensive to the audience, none of them do much of anything interesting. These people have the power to control the very elements around them: air, water, earth and fire; and yet none of them use these abilities in a way that feels logical. Instead it comes across as "well now I don't have anything for them to do in this scene, so we'll just give them some CG fire to play with, yay!"
Note to anyone who saw the trailer and was intrigued enough to want to check this out: DON'T. You will not enjoy yourself. You will not be happy that you gave it a try. It's a trap! Watch the series instead.
Score: 2/10
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