Got a chance to see it.

See what? Well, Avatar of course. I must say it did not disappoint. The 3D was really good, both the stereoscopic 3D and the 3D computer animation. Somehow the stereoscopic effect seemed to work better with the life action footage, must be some camera Mr. Cameron helped create. I think this has something to do with the depth of field, but I may be wrong.

Maybe I am getting old, but I could have done without the all out war. Bit too much testosterone aggression here and there. The Epic destruction had a strong 9-11 feel to it and was very impressive though. Some plot points were rather predictable, but I agree with the friend who gave me the opportunity to go and see the film by looking after my son for the afternoon: great to see a movie where the scientists are not the bad guys!

Now I can go and read the article in last months Computer Graphics World (printed in Stereo 3D!) to see if my observation is correct that they only used Sub Surface Scattering on the hero characters and even then faked most of it, or if there was some other reason these blue monkeys did not look all that "fleshy". May have been by design, or just to keep render times in check, or both! Yeah, I could not help myself but look at the technique of this amazing bit of cinematography most of the time. It is not the type of flick one goes to see to be deeply moved by the character development, but one can get engulfed in the action and occasionally loose oneself in the spectacle and forget about professional observations for a moment.