Tuesday 19 January 2010

Avatar (n) A Peruvian form of bitumen, composed of the crushed bodies of Gardner beetles (Dactylopius Avagardnerus). Gardner beetles were discovered in the Nineteen Forties by Hollywood actress Ava Gardner, who often spent her spare time in Peru, classifying insects and cage-fighting with nuns.

vodka and monsters
wetherspoons. three ninety-nine,
and then ‘avatar’.

After two double Smirnoff and Monsters (Monster being the new Red Bull, or, as far as I could tell, the old Red Bull called something else) the Ugly One and I donned our 3-D specs for ‘Avatar’ at the Shepherds Bush Vue.
It was marvellous, despite the fact that the lead female character looks like a blue Katie Price. I was particularly impressed that the US produced a film blatantly demonstrating the US tendency to muscle in on other cultures when there might be a profit in it. Particularly telling was the phrase from the brutal American general, ‘We will fight Terror with Terror!’ which has the strong and repellent whiff of George Bush about it.
The 3-D was outstanding, and this is probably the first film that uses 3-D intelligently rather than a gimmick. I did have to laugh at the use of the word ‘Unobtainium’ which is a phrase coined many decades ago in SF circles to describe those rare metals which the heroes of the works of authors such as John W Campbell and EE ‘Doc’ Smith used to discover on far flung planets, and which could not be found anywhere else.
Rather than hand them back, I kept my 3-D glasses. I paid for them. They are mine.