-and this will be the shortest and most spoiler-FREE review I have ever written. Behold:

PLOT: Oh, James Cameron. Why did you go the way of George Lucas? Why oh why, as you sip Dom Perignon in a diamond flute bought from Titanic royalties, could you not have hired brilliant scriptwriters? But nooooooooooooo, you had to write it yourself. The result? LAMEST PLOT EVER. I could tell you the fate of every single character the second they came onscreen. Punkt. No exceptions. And we never quite reached character 3D, did we, Cameron, oh you Cameron? Two-dimensionality, sure. Better than The Tale of Two Cities? Undoubtedly. But shit, son, I can do better than that and I've never written a feature-length script before. For realsies, babe.

ACTING: I was impressed by how the three leads imbued heart into such a lackluster script. I loved Sigourney Weaver, Sam Worthington was, shall we say, quite worthy, and Zoe Saldana is undoubtedly the BAMFiest BAMF to ever BAMF the BAMF. Seriously, and I rarely get a chance to say this, so I'm going to all-caps it: A WOMAN HAD THE BEST PERFORMANCE IN THE FILM, OH YES, OH YES SHE DID. And motion-capture, at that.

And finally,

THE VISUALS: Um, I came. Metaphorically. I have been visually spoiled for films, forever and ever and ever. And ever. And also, for eveeeerrr. IT'S SO PRETTY. IT WAS THE MOST GORGEOUS THING I'VE EVER SEEN. I'M GOING TO GO TO PANDORA AND HIT THE GLOWING FUNGI AND AND SCARE THE GLOWY-FLY-Y LIZARDS AND RIDE THE GIANT FUCKING DINOSAUR DRAGONS. Because this was a 'sci-fi' film, but really it was a fantasy novel. And I approve of this.

I saw this with some friends, and after we got out of the crushing crowd and into the hallway, we just stood staring at each other. At length the one friend who's about as geeky as me (if not geekier) broke the silence: "This is me. Speechless." I nodded emphatically. It was trufax.

VERDICT: Go see it. Yeah, it's two and a half hours, and yeah, it's predictable from start to finish. But that's not the point. It's a turning point in cinema. When I saw a little kid after the moving walking out with his parents, all I could think was, "They didn't make movies like this when I was little. How absolutely JAZZED must his imagination be right now? What wonderful things will he create in the future because his brain was so inspired?" And see it in 3D, too. It's just...not going to be the same seeing it in any other format....even though 3D televisions will be on the market within a year or two....not the same. Not the same.