The Oscars were last night, and I decided that it was time for me to chip in with my opinion on the movie that many considered to be the best of the year. I am talking, of course, about “Avatar.”

The movie grossed $2.555 billion worldwide as of March 5 and passed “Titanic” to become the highest grossing film of all time. It was nominated for nine Oscars. Obviously, people like this movie, and they are paying to see it both here in the United States and abroad.

Knowing this, it makes sense that almost every single person I have talked to about this movie is in love with it. Most of the reviews I have read online boast about the movie as an “epic.” Tom Long of the Detroit News even made the following bold statement in his review – “I have seen the future of movies, and it is Avatar.” Seems like you would be hard pressed to find anyone with anything bad to say about the film, but then there is me.

The movie was terrible. It was at best, a bad rip-off of a combination of other similar movies. If you have seen it, I want you think about the premise for the movie for a moment. The main character spends time with his enemy and eventually finds himself identifying more strongly with his enemy than his own people. Is this really the framework for a film that took James Cameron years to come up with? I liked that movie better the first time when it was called “Dances with Wolves.” It is almost as if Cameron just watched “Dances with Wolves” and decided that movie was pretty good, and should use it as the framework for his movie. If we are talking simply about screenplays, “Avatar” was not the “future of movies.” Far from it. It was actually a history of movies, specifically the one that dominated the Oscars in 1990.

Considering the budget was over $230 million, it is also hard to believe how bad the acting was. All the characters were playing stereotypical roles, making the story very tough to believe. The scientists thought the military people didn’t understand them. The businessmen was more interested in money than the natives. The military characters didn’t take the scientists seriously. That is all very fresh. I definitely have never seen a movie where the scientists are portrayed as weak and caring, the businessmen as selfish and greedy and the military people as heartless and arrogant. What innovative character development.

With those cookie-cutter characters, it is no wonder they couldn’t find any one respectable to fill the roles. Who on Earth were the actors in this movie? $230 million and we can’t even pull down a single hot actress or an actor who has done anything respectable in a lead role? The main character is played by the guy who wasn’t sure he was a Terminator in “Terminator: Salvation.” Come on. The weak scientist who is all about his job is best known for portraying a loser in “Dodgeball.” Do I even need to mention Sigourney Weaver? David Ortiz thinks she’s washed up.

But the problem with this movie is not how bad the writing is or how bad the acting is – it is how bad the movie becomes when the two are combined. These two components cannot be poorly done in a movie that is supposed to be taken seriously, especially when the premise is so hard to believe.

This movie felt a lot more like “Alien vs. Predator” than Oscar material.

Just look at some of the key parts in the story. The setting of the movie is primarily on a planet called Pandora, which, according to Colonel Quaritch, isn’t like Kansas. On this planet, large blue creatures with tails and long hair – called the Na’vi – are running around living allegedly at peace with the environment. The religion of the Na’vi consists of praying to a giant tree. We also have Dragon-like monsters flying around the planet that can apparently be tamed if a blue creature wins a wrestling match with them and is then able to stick its hair into a hole on the dragon-like creature’s head. Are these really elements of a movie that was nominated for nine Oscars? This can’t be serious.

I am supposed to believe that a human would be willing to turn on his own race after a few weeks because he fell in love with a blue creature? That’s the main conflict in the film? It would’ve taken unreal acting to make me believe something that dumb, but Cameron forgot to get any good actors to sell this unrealistic garbage. This film was not moving. This film was lame.

Yet everyone seems to like it. I feel like Mugatu did in “Zoolander” when he was the only person who realized Derek had only one look.

When other ridiculous movies like “Alien vs. Predator” have bad writing and bad acting, I don’t complain because it’s is not pretending to be something that it is not. “Avatar” is touted as something new and different, but is really just a rip-off of other movies that also features bad acting.

One would think ripping off a bunch of other famous movies would culminate in one really good movie – but that just didn’t happen here. This was a glorified spoof movie. “Avatar” had good special effects and makes for good “Happy Meal” toys, but shouldn’t be getting a whiff of the Academy Awards.

Alex Perry is a Collegian columnist. He can be reached at [email protected].