THEMATIC COHERENCE:
 
One of the most muddled moments in the history of cinema is in Titanic when Rose throws the heart shaped diamond into the ocean.  It's thematically incoherent.  Was it supposed to symbolize that she was giving up materialism?  No, she had that arc/epiphany when she was a teenager and Jack died.  So what the heck was it supposed to mean?  Oh, that's right, I promised to take the "best."
 
Avatar's eco-myth message -- that we are all the same and connected to one another and to our home planet -- isn't earth-shattering (oops) in its intellectual depth or complexity.  But, you have to give kudos to Cameron for expressing the idea thoroughly and in an all-encompassing way.  The physical problem of the Na'vi battling the soldiers from Earth and the internal problem of Jake letting go of " the us versus them" mentality and committing to being a Na'vi are both solved by the same idea: the principle that everything is connected.  
 
There are several nice touches:

• The hair tendril thing that interfaces with the animals
• The way the other tribes and EVEN the animals join the cause
• The big black beast that lowers its shoulder to Neytiri
• The idea that the banshees and Na'vi are connected for life
• The  Deku tree, err, I mean, the Sacred tree that is a LITERAL connection to the ancestors
• "I see you" tagline

VISUAL STORYTELLING:
 
The film is full of stunning visuals. The scene where Jake bonds with his banshee and rides with Neytiri is pure cinema.  Especially in 3-D, the time spent on "just flying" is magical and never boring.  The moment is so effective because it's also an important beat in their romantic relationship.  If the animal can trust Jake, then subconsciously so can she.  He is moving closer to being and seeing the Na'vi, which is the arc he needs to fulfill before he is worthy of her love.  Maybe someone needs to write a book about Cameron and these "King of the World" moments. 
 
Look how Cameron avoids talky exposition when the Sacred Tree tries to save the wounded Grace by permanently putting  her "spirit" into her avatar.  If it's going to work later for Jake, of course it has to fail now.  But the rules and point of the ritual are established here so that at the end we IMMEDIATELY know what's going on as Jake submits to the same process.  There is no time needed to explain it.
 
Speaking of visual storytelling, if you want to learn from modern blockbusters how to do things right, check out the 10-minute wordless montage in the first act of Up which chronicles the husband's and wife's relationship.  This is also pure cinema and the following three shots probably encompass less than 20 seconds:

1. A wide shot of the hill where they usually joyfully picnic.  As she climbs, she falters.  He moves toward her. Cut to:
2. Tracking shot where he is with her in a hospital bed. Cut to:
3. He is sitting on the floor alone in front of her casket by himself after the funeral.  Some colorful balloons counterpoint the glum shot, reminding us of their levity and love and foreshadowing what is to come.

 Wow.  
 
I started my WWTBD? column because of Bruce Springsteen's line, "We learned more from a three-minute record than we ever learned in school."  Well, you can learn more from a 30-second Pixar montage than you could ever learn in film school.
 
... now back to Avatar ...
 
CRISP PROTAGONIST/ANTAGONIST RELATIONSHIP:
 
Colonel Quaritch is the perfect ideological nemesis for Jake.  They have both been injured by the/an enemy and the story shows how they take the complete opposite paths. In a sense, they are different sides of the same coin.  Jake's journey is to understand that there are no boundaries between us and them,  living beings and nature, nature and the planet, and this life and the afterlife.  It's about unity, oneness.  As a Marine, the Colonel sees things with fascist rigidity.  For him, it's about us versus them.  To him, the planet and the Na'vi are the OTHER.  He sees Jake's literal miscegenation as a betrayal not only of him, but of the entire human race.  The Colonel also serves to raise the stakes by giving Jake -- and the story -- a kick in the rear by adding a ticking clock or difficult demand.  
 
INTERNATIONAL APPEAL:
 
Some of this is related to Cameron's reliance on images to tell the story.  But notice that during some of the scenes with Jake and the Na'vi clan, they speak in their own language.  Cameron will use no subtitles and allow us to be confused like Jake. And then he will use no subtitles but allow the conversation to be completely clear by its context. And finally he will use subtitles for the conversation.  There are artistic reasons for this choice: You get to keep the audience in a point of view similar to that of Jake's.  However, from a worldwide marketing perspective, this means these sequences are watched and enjoyed in the exact same way for speakers of all other languages: The Na'vi speak a language that is foreign to all viewers and so the subtitles are in the language of the audience.
 
These are the same principles that allow genre films and straight-to-DVD horror films to play better in foreign countries.   A monster chasing a woman through the woods plays just as well in Germany as it does in Korea.  If you are making a horror film or small thriller, try to think about long sequences that don't rely on words or cultural context.  I don't even think of a film like The Orphanage as foreign because the experience of watching it is so unrelated to its dialogue.  And for a non-English speaking audience member, the first half of Wall-E must be a similar experience.  Films like Paris, Je t'Aime (and perhaps Don't Look Now) also make strategic casting and language choices to create international appeal.
 
CREATION OF ITS OWN WORLD:
 
Mainstream cinema often has an escapist element to it.  People want to be transported to a different place, literally or figuratively.  In some ways Avatar is a pretty extreme example of this phenomenon considering that Cameron literally created every blade of grass using technology.   But this aside, all this creativity is integrated into the fantasy world through the storytelling and ultimately become essential plot points:  

 

 

The trick for up-and-coming writers is to create and exploit a complete world within a budget.  You aren't allowed to have an Avatar- or Lord of the Rings-sized scope.  But look at what District 9 did in creating its own world.  Even if you are making films in a completely different genre, the challenge remains: Create a unified world and stick with it.  Here are a few movies that do a great job of creating their own world, several of them on a budget: Brick, Pi, The Wrestler, Memento, Being John Malkovich, Where The Wild Things Are, Do the Right Thing, most of Woody Allen's films.
 
Another great example of where everything filters through the created world is in Up in the Air.  My favorite meet-cute this year is between Vera Farmiga and George Clooney where they flirt by discussing their membership cards (page 16-17 of the script).  This is also an example of exploitation of concept on the scene level.
 
ATTENTION TO DETAIL:
 
Sam Worthington is filming Clash of the Titans. I know the dude is probably pretty buff, but did you notice his scrawny little legs in the film?  Several times when he had to load himself into a wheelchair or his Avatar "control station," he would lift and move his legs.  I thought they were like a rubber prosthetic/prop but some sources say they were CGI.  Either way, it's a nice touch.  
 
STICK-TO-IT-IVENESS:
 
Cameron took a decade to work on the special-effects technology that would allow him to make the Avatar that was in his head.  His goal was pretty big: to create a franchise from scratch, something that could compete with the blockbusters of Harry Potter what were based on preexisting material.  Yeah, I know Cameron didn't have to sweat a day job and was probably going to find financing one way or another, but he also had the vision to know that his story was universal and that the audience was going to be there when the film was ready.
 
On a smaller scale, the importance of stick-to-it-iveness showed up this year at Sundance.  In 1995 when I was director of development for Allison Anders's producer Bill Ewart and his partner David Peters, I covered this small relationship drama called Blue Valentine.   It wasn't very commercial but it was an honest and intense drama; the kind of movie I have always wanted to (and sometimes get to) make.  In one of our meetings, David compared it to Bergman's Scenes from a Marriage.  At the time, I hadn't seen the film (Hey, I was in my 20s and, btw, had seen most of Bergman's films and had even met Max Von Sydow.)  Well,  I went out and watched Scenes and it became a major inspiration for a script I finished about eight years ago and am still trying to make.  Well, I guess I still have seven years... Blue Valentine finally got made, starring Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams, and just sold at Sundance to the Weinsteins for about a million bucks.  It was directed by the co-writer, Derek Cianfrance. 
 
It's a ridiculously tough business right now but when the dust clears in a few years, there will still be room for the writers with great scripts and the courage to stick around.