Avatar: I should hate this movie.

Avatar: I should hate this movie.  It depicts a resource-hungry, western-style civilization destroying the native inhabitants of a planet through technological and military might.

The story is predictable and the characters one-sided.  The marine kills, the natives are misunderstood savages.  Everything fits into the expected cliches of a cultural clash on a clandestine planet.

On top of the stereotypes, the hype should have killed this movie, but it didn't.  Avatar is a masterpiece.

Avatar not only lives up to the hype, it smashes expectations. It is not about the story, the characters, or the cynical prognostication of our modern-day world.  Its about escapism. Avatar is the first movie that made me feel like I was transported to another time and planet. 

There weren't special effects, there was a living and breathing world in the theater unlike anything I've ever experienced.  I could blather on about how stunning Avatar was to watch, but words can not do it justice.

My only complaint with the movie is the macguffin of unobtainium. That aside, its a hardly noticeable subtraction from an otherwise perfect movie.