I totally enjoyed that more than I thought I would. It was a struggle at times - that running time - but it was quite moving. Then I guess Jim Cameron is a dab hand at trope manipulation - it's hard not to be stirred when the peaceful natives have their villages pummelled (again), or to feel for whales who are harpooned, or to be roused when the whales kick arse, or to love it when whalers get devastated, or to be moved when babies play in the ocean and people die, and people have a final glimpse of their final dead family member.
Also it hits on universal themes: fear of protecting family, bickering siblings, the good son versus the troublesome son, the walking stakes kids, the kids feeling out of step.\
The flaws are big but oddly one would think they were easily fixable. They set up this plot about colonising Pandora but that gets forgotten (along with Edie Falco's unconvincing general) to hang out with whales. I mean, weren't the forest people at war again? Isn't that still going on? Would the baddies devote all these resources to tracking down Sam Worthington once he actually leaves the forest people - I mean he's no longer a threat/mastermind because he's gone right? Why didn't they just make it a generic flight thing - he tries to flee but realises he can't any more. And Zoe Saldana's part is nothing. For a hippy movie it's very patriarchal.
Still, I was engrossed more often than not, the spectacle was fun, as was re using jungle movie tropes (there's even a comely native girl walking out of the ocean), and I got a little teary at the end.
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