In Hollywood films, one rarely has to look hard.
James Cameron's "Avatar" (grading and discussion)
- Thread starter chrisspringob
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In Hollywood films, one rarely has to look hard.
The average viewer needed someone to whom they could relate.
The next film could be, safely, told from the Na'vi perspective.
To have the first film be told from the Na'vi perspective would have been too hard for the audience and, therefore, too risky for the filmmaker.
Hicks may not be traditional love interest for Ripley--the closest scene in Aliens to a love scene is when he shows Ripley 'everything' (on the pulse rifle)--but there is no doubt that Cameron was setting Ripley, Hicks, and Newt up as a family unit. They're specifically framed as such in several scenes, and Cameron has indicated these as his intentions in several interviews, which might explain why he doesn't care for Alien 3 all that much, since it completely destroys that family unit. It's not as strong a story point as the surrogate mother/stepdaughter relationship between Ripley and Newt, but it's there.
If it's "conventional wisdom" that narrowmindedness, theft and beating up on the helpless are bad, good for us. Throwing in murder and rape as "conventionally considered bad" wouldn't alarm me either. Having those as values doesn't necessarily lead to being simplistic.
No, but what is completely simplistic is the idea that out of hundreds and hundreds of spacefaring humans, including who knows how many scientists, only a couple in the movie seemed to have a problem with it.
That's wildly implausible, given that the humans in the movie are all the descendents of us, the viewers of the movie, all of whom agree that narrowmindedness, theft, and beating up on the helpless are bad.
Further, such a huge expedition to another star, one where we found LIFE, would have so many layers of international control it would boggle the mind. It would surely be a century after discovery before anyone even bothered with a soil sample, given the vastly more amazing biology going on.
Yeah how can it be sexist it's inter-species love, dating and mating, and she saves his life twice once with the Avatar and once for his physical body. I don't get how people can criticize that character she is a very strong female character, pretty much as strong as they come.
Okay, fine. Lesbians... wait, that's guy bait, er, male homosexuals... er, wait, that removes women altogether...
Can't they just be friends? And have equal screen time?
Isn't there theft, narrowmindedness, and problems with thje helpless right now, though? If we have them now, we're probably going to have them in future.
Also, it's one thing for us all to sit here and be armchair moralists. It's another to be in the Avatar situation. It wouldn't surprise me if not everyone made the choice of Jake, Grace et al. - I doubt I would, for one (the military-corporation just seems to be pretty powerful and I'd probably consider their victory inevitable, count my blessings and pick up my paycheck.)
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Indeed. That's what makes them heroic.
It's the hero's journey. At the start, all you want is some power converters from Tosche station.
I disagree. I think the audience had no problem identifying with the Na'vi, and would dare to say the appeal of the film is precisely in its escapist quality in which you get to imagine yourself being a groovy 10-foot tall blue person who rides dragons.
If LotR could have a 3 and a half foot tall Hobbit for a hero and do fine, I have a hard time believing Avatar couldn't have had a 10-foot tall warrior princess for a hero and done just as well. The only reason to use Jake was lazy writing. It was easier to write the story about an alien world with a main character who serves primarily to walk around going "hey, what's that?" and have scientists, military guys and aliens explain what things are. That's a cheesy way to tell a story and no amount of fancy FX can hide it.
Actually, it was easier to convince a movie studio to give you upwards of $300-$400 million.
"No, no, trust me. Sure, no one has been able to do this before, but I need your half billion dollars to make a movie where the only main characters are photorealistic, 12 foot tall blue cat people in 3D! We don't need an antagonist the audience can relate to, you're thinking old school. Cat people! Photo realistic, I swear!
Can I have your money, now?"
It's the hero's journey. At the start, all you want is some power converters from Tosche station.
Exactly, and convince your Uncle to let you get the hell off the fucking farm.
That's true. The story is also designed around the technology, which is clever. We get our conventional human lead, but along the way we identify also with his CGI self until that version is actually taking up most of the screentime. We're being weaned onto the idea of a CGI principal.
Jake is also a conveinent exposition device - as indeed was Frodo, who was largely ignorant of the goings-on outside the Shire. When inviting the audience into a fantasy world, well, first, they have no idea how this works. Just hurling them in with no explanation at all and hope they pick it up as we go along is risky, and rarely done (the original Star Wars leans a little in this direction early in the film, but settles back to the formula once we get wide-eyed Luke and expository Obi-Wan).
I think it would've been a bit more interesting if Jake had been sent on the mission in the normal fashion, but then suffered some brain damage/memory loss in hypersleep. Due to the damage he's more believably ignorant of some of the basics and more easily confused about whether he's a Na'vi or a human. You also wouldn't need the story about a dead-brother DNA/company forgot to take out life insurance with AIG.
Although this has echoes of Bruce Willis in "Twelve Monkeys," which was confusing to viewers, I think it would be better than having Jake side with whoever offered him the best deal on new legs, and the human villainy doesn't have to be so over the top to provide a plausible excuse for him to rebel.
Although this has echoes of Bruce Willis in "Twelve Monkeys," which was confusing to viewers, I think it would be better than having Jake side with whoever offered him the best deal on new legs, and the human villainy doesn't have to be so over the top to provide a plausible excuse for him to rebel.
Jesus Christ, Jake didn't side with the aliens because they offered him the "best deal on new legs" he sided with them because they were being wronged by the human presence, and he realized what the humans were doing was wrong -which it was- and he acted on it.
problem was... jake and those with avatar's saw both sides of the situation... everybody else had to believe the protaganda spewing from their leaders mouths...
THe Michelle Roudriguez character didn't have an Avatar and she knew it was wrong. You don't have to be a genius or screw blue people to get it into your head that nuking the crap out of the alien's home wasn't a good idea.
true but she associated with the Na'vi.... everybody else didn't...
thought of your question just didn't answer it when i originally posted...