Preview of James Cameron’s “Avatar” at SM IMAX 3D

I wasn’t expecting to win ClickTheCity’s contest when I blogged about it last week. But luckily, my cousin who read my post did win it! Thanks Daryl for inviting us! This was my second time at SM North Edsa IMAX. The first one was Harry Potter 6 last month.

The “Titanic” director himself, James Cameron, prepared the preview for the highly anticipated film “Avatar”. The preview event was called Avatar Day and it began last August 21, the same day the teaser trailer came out. Select digital-3D and IMAX 3D theaters around the world have unveiled the exclusive preview. Here in the Philippines, SM North Edsa’s new IMAX theatre was the venue for this event last August 24.

“In the epic action adventure AVATAR, James Cameron, the director of “Titanic,” takes us to a spectacular new world beyond our imagination. On the distant moon Pandora, a reluctant hero embarks on a journey of redemption and discovery as he leads a heroic battle to save a civilization. The film was first conceived by Cameron 14 years ago, when the means to realize his vision did not yet exist. Now, after four years of actual production work, AVATAR delivers a fully immersive cinematic experience of a new kind, where the revolutionary technology invented to make the film, disappears into the emotion of the characters and the sweep of the story.”

The 20-minute preview is mostly an extended version of the teaser trailer. Random scenes from the movie where shown one after another. It began with Cameron introducing the preview. The first scene showed a commander explaining the Avatar program to some candidates, I presume. Jake Sully (Sam Worthington), the lead character, enters the scene in some advanced wheelchair. The second scene is set in a lab where Jake goes inside a machine to become an Avatar, a hybrid of human and Na’vi species. It ends with him escaping the lab, excited about his newfound body.

The third scene is probably my favorite part of this preview. Jake is attacked by the creature shown below. The action-packed chase was breathtaking to behold in 3D!

In the fourth scene, Jake is saved by Neytiri (Zoe Saldana), a female Na’vi. The next scene shows Jake trying to thank her but Neytiri argues that he shouldn’t because it’s sad that she had to kill the animal. Jake asks why she did it anyway and Neytiri replies that it’s because he has a “strong heart”. A beautiful view of the lush rainforest at Pandora is shown at the end of this scene. It was awe-inspiring to see those fireflies(?) and alien plants in 3D.

The last scene shows Jake taming some dragon-like creature, presumably so he could use it for battles. The flying scene is just as astonishing to see in 3D and is my second favorite here.

Then they showed the teaser trailer in full 3D. And I must say that seeing it in that format is truly a wholly different experience from 2D. It only reinforced in me the fact that “Avatar” must be seen in 3D to fully appreciate all the work done on this epic film and for maximum enjoyment as well. We’re still a little fuzzy on the details of the story but the 3D and great special effects already makes this movie worthy of an IMAX viewing.

I still need to get used to wearing those 3D glasses on top of my own specs though. For some reason, I didn’t get that dizzying effect on the trailer’s fast scenes unlike in the actual preview. Well I hope the final cut of the film won’t have that problem too as I can’t imagine enduring that for more than two hours!

AVATAR will be shown in theaters worldwide on December 18, 2009. You can now watch the trailer at Apple.com (of course, in 2D only). And here are some more pictures I took at SM North Edsa IMAX with my cousins. We had a lot of fun and the food was great! ^_^