Yes Mr. Cameron I loved the colour and creative depths to which you plunged. In fact seeing the delights of another world made my heart skip a beat that indeed in this great cosmos that I believe God had his hand in creating, there must certainly exist different worlds waiting to be explored, possibly after this life.
However,
Showing us on one hand that violence against a culture and people is wrong, and then taking that peaceful culture and make them use the violence force you despise against their enemies, doesn't convice us that nonviolence is the better response. If anything it brings home the point that violence is the only solution and you can maybe win the day with it. At least until they return with bigger ships and bombs.
But it sure was pretty to watch.
That's an interesting perspective. I'd have said that the Na'Vi were portrayed as a 'violent' people who lived in harmony with the biosphere of their planet. An example would be when the 'leading lady' was asked why she didn't kill sully instead of leading him to hometree.
ReplyDeleteCurious that you should mention this - we saw the film last night at a screening by the village social club, so it's quite fresh still.
That's the same response I had after seeing the film.
ReplyDeleteAll I could think about was Fern Gully and was a bit disappointed when nature didn't get rid of the nasty humans. I thought he should have spent another pile of time on the last half of the movie. The first half was great.
ReplyDeleteWe saw it in 3d which was cool. I get tired of movies that always have to have a bad guy.
ReplyDeleteToni, I agree. I was thinking through that tension because they were also portrayed as gentle people who like you said, interacted with their "Biosphere." That's true.
ReplyDeleteTammy, that was what Lauralea said too, about nature taking care of the bad guys.
:)
It just felt like here was a billion dollar movie with a hundredthousand dollar ending.
He had a chance to do something big with it and he chose a cheap, standard movie way out.
It didn't help that it wasn't a terribly original story. I know that good vs. evil is standard science fiction material, but there must be other ways to tell this story. Instead we have Fern Gully, Pocahontas, Dances With Wolves and The Last Samurai, to name a few films with an almost identical plot.
ReplyDeleteBut maybe that's the best way to tell the story.
It is interesting to step back and think about the film now. I'm trying to decide if using a black actress as the basis for the main girl was cynical not. However the manner in which they mourned their loss and dead in the film reminded me of every film I've seen portraying such things among Africans. I wonder how many others in the Na'Vi cast were also black?
ReplyDeleteSigourney Weaver's Avatar made me think of the Aristocats.