The feeling of disappointment I experienced while walking out of The Last Airbender was tantamount to the feeling one gets when he finds out that the new puppy you were supposed to get for Christmas was, in fact, a stuffed toy. M. Night Shyamalan’s take on the beloved Avatar: The Last Airbender cartoon falls flat on its face, tripped up by the movie’s own glaring inadequacies.
Every college student who takes freshman Comp is taught the quintessential rule for storytelling: show your readers what to believe, do not tell them. Apparently M. Night forgot this rule, as the movie is just one long telling of a story, instead of showing us a story that has already been proven to be a compelling tale. A friend I was with likened it to the “What you missed” portion at the beginning of a show. It would have worked better if M. Night had just walked onto the screen to tell you what happened, because at least that would have given the audience something to laugh at.
Many of the key aspects of the original cartoon, like Ang and the gang’s irony and humor, the developing relationships between the characters, and any form of Uncle’s comic relief is absent. Those who haven’t seen the cartoon can’t get a sense of who these characters are; when something grave happens to them, the audience just doesn’t care.
The kids playing these roles must have been given a day to rehearse and a day to shoot. There are several glaring scenes where the acting is utterly unconvincing and, at times, laughable (and people in the theater did indeed laugh). Even if you are a fan of the cartoon (which I ardently am), you still feel that these are not the same characters, but imposters.
M. Night tries to take a comedic drama and turn it into a solid, dark drama, but a drama only works if you give the audience something to care about, something to make them concerned about the events happening on-screen. The overwhelming feeling in the air above the audience as the lights come up is “okay…so what?”. It is a shame such beautiful special effects (the movie’s only light saving grace) were wasted on such an untalented movie.
Here comes the point where I invoke the cliché of “M. Night Shyamalan has lost his touch and should not make movies.” I would feel bad about using a cliché if it were not irrevocably true. As this latest addition to M. Night’s failed movies proves, M. Night should take a serious look at hanging up his camera equipment and putting down his pen, at least for a good long while.
well said Jared. If only he cared about the story enough…