The Last Airbender, 2010

i loved the series and i had lots of hope when i went to the cinema. but this movie was disappointing and bad in so many ways. the acting was poor. the actors didn't match to the characters in the series, the plot was changed, etc. so i can just agree with all the others: this movie is totally disappointing and not worth watching it!

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M. Night Shyamalan, during the late 90s and early 00s, established himself as a talented and creative force in the cinema with such classics as "The Sixth Sense", "Unbreakable" and "Signs." His creative storytelling then went in a downward spiral with dubious fables such as "Lady in the Water" and "The Happening." "The Last Airbender", based on the popular animated series, is a departure for him, and I was hoping it would be a comeback for his near-tarnished career. Alas, that is not to be. "The Last Airbender" is a painfully dull and laughable fantasy that makes "The Dark Crystal" look like "The Lord of the Rings". Without going into the convoluted story, I'm just gonna go and talk about what's wrong with this film. I'll start with the casting. The characters in the show are all of Asian descent, but in the film, they are of all different ethnicities. That's not really the problem; the problem is that we have racial stereotypical casting where the heroes are all light-skinned and the villains are all dark-skinned. This is actually kind of the opposite in the show: the waterbenders are dark-skinned and the firebenders are light-skinned. Well, maybe that could have passable if the acting was any good, but it's not. The performances are all flat, stone-faced, and laughably awkward. I think much of this has to be blamed on Shyamalan's script and direction, as he is telling them to act like this. There is then the overuse of exposition. In between the action, which has fairly cheesy special effects, there are scenes of explaining and explaining. The character Katara also has voice-over narrations that completely keep us at a distance and do not help develop the characters and action. The use of exposition does not help us understand the story or this world very much, in fact, it makes everything even more confusing and we sit there feeling very frustrated. Now, I'm not really sure who would like this movie: fans of the show would be outraged, non-fans would be confused and bored. These feelings were exactly what I went through when I saw this film. On my first viewing, I was not familiar with the show, and I found it to be very silly and labored. I then started watching the series, and I fell in love with it [the series]. I watched the film a second time, and this time, I found myself pointing out mistakes and changes that seemed to go completely against what the series stood for. The series is full of excitement and humor, and it is also very intelligent about the clash between innocence and responsibility, world relations, and the consequences of fighting. The film does not address any of these points; instead, it's all about the showy action, and mindless blabbering explanations that were never established in the first place. In fact, the main conflict/event from the series that sets the gears in to motion (Sozin's Comet) is never even brought to Aang's attention. I could list everything about how the film differs from the show, but that's for another review. I do have hope that Shyamalan will some day have a comeback and that his reputation will be saved. Unfortunately, "The Last Airbender" is not the film that will save him. It is a horrible mess that does a great disservice to a wonderful television series.

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As for the perspective of kids and as a family event, I can see how this movie would be fun. I, however, was expecting a darker take on character development and this film proved to be not more than eye-candy.

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Well I guess i should start by saying that I am a fan of the TV series and that if this movie had not been based on the tv series it would be enjoyable. However, i do have a lot of problems with it. I am going to ignore the whoel controversy over casting because at tis point it doesn't matter, but i will say either the acting ro the writing of the movie left a LOT to be wanted. Sokka while being hilariously sarcastic in the tv show, was lackluster and almost boring in the movie, Aang, who was the naive and unaware boy in the tv show, did not seem even close to that in the movie. The story: For me the story seemed as if he took the main characters, and a few important cities, and then changed everything else and completely ignored all the character growth that the characters experienced through the series. There were parts in the tv show that were missing that made the characters who they were. No mvie goer will see Zuku as the shattered and pitiful man he is, instead theywill merely hate him as a vilian, Katara will not be seen as the strong willed girl who fights to learn her bending, she will remain the whiny one. The Combat: It does nto seem like the actors in the movie stuck to the four basic martial arts that were used to build all of the bending moves. The moves did not seem to fit the bending styles they used, and the fight were nothign like the tv shows epic fast paced bending battles. Its like all the soldiers would wait 10 minutes for Aang to jump arond and spin before he blasts them away. Mispronunciation: If you are going to make a movie based on something the LEAST you can do is say the names right... Conclusion: Do not waste your time or money on this movie, instead watch a couple pisodes of the tv show, it is infinitely better.

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I decided to give this movie a fair shake, given that I loved the series and had been planning on seeing it with my kids. I knew that the reviews were abysmal, and Shyamalan can't direct traffic let alone a movie but I went anyway. My judgement is this. Its a really, really good made for tv movie. Better than any tv movie I've seen. If you compare it to tv movies, it was great. If you compare it to real movies, it was a huge pile. Writing- abysmal. Directing-abysmal. Effects - borderline abysmal but sometimes really good. I don't blame Shymalan exclusively. I blame Nickelodeon, exclusively. I think they mucked with things and Shyamalan directed the bus off the bridge. So why did I rate it 3 stars? Well, I like the series so I'll eat what I can get. And I'll watch it again when its on DVD, and the commentary. Its like a post mortem operation, just to see what happened during the horrible traffic accident. Good luck with this, I still recommend that you see it if you really like the series. Otherwise, watch the cartoon and skip the movie for now.

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