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James Cameron's "Avatar" (grading and discussion)

Grade "Avatar"

  • Excellent

    Votes: 166 50.0%

  • Above Average

    Votes: 85 25.6%

  • Average

    Votes: 51 15.4%

  • Below Average

    Votes: 11 3.3%

  • Terrible

    Votes: 19 5.7%
  • Total voters
    332
MarianLH said:
The actual line in the film is a little ambiguous: "Back home they were Marines, fighting for freedom, but now they're just hired guns working for a paycheck." Ex-marines, or just a shift in perspective? It could be interpreted either way.

Marian
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I'm going with mercs. Else the fact that they got their asses kicked would have implications far-reaching enough to dampen the Na'vi victory.
 
Rii said:
MarianLH said:
The actual line in the film is a little ambiguous: "Back home they were Marines, fighting for freedom, but now they're just hired guns working for a paycheck." Ex-marines, or just a shift in perspective? It could be interpreted either way.

Marian
Click to expand...

I'm going with mercs. Else the fact that they got their asses kicked would have implications far-reaching enough to dampen the Na'vi victory.
Click to expand...

I still say mercenaries too. Most if not all of the mercenaries today are ex-military, which leds me to believe that there is a mindset that wants to continue to be military but would rather follow sudo military discipline.

In my mind the security/fax military that RDA had in place on Pandora were attracted there more for the violence than any actual protecting. Quaritch described Pandora as worse than hell and to him it probably was, but he saw what he wanted to see. He wanted Pandora to be worse than Hell to allow him to reduce the Na'vi to savages and therefore subhuman and not entitled to any consideration.

He may not have known it, but his mindset was mercenary disguised as something like military with him in control. Even worse it appeared he believed his own lies.

Brit
 
Jake is a classically "unreliable narrator" - certainly he sees his military service and those of his fellows as a noble endeavor, and sees a difference between that and veterans working as military contractors.

Notably, he'll soon find himself eagerly doing the same.

We do not know, however, that the causes and issues for which Sully and the others fought would appear distinct from fighting for the interests of RDA to an outside observer.
 
RoJoHen said:
That's how I took it. They're still marines, but the situation is so different from anything they've done before that their normal rules don't really apply.
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If you look back to the bald-faced imperialism of the 19th and early 20th century, it's not actually unprecedented.

And I wonder if, by making them specifically marines (since ex-military mercenaries would presumably have come from the Army as well) Cameron wasn't consciously alluding to retired USMC general Smedley Butler's famous 1935 "War Is A Racket" speech:

"I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested.

Looking back on it, I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents."
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Sounds a lot like what's going on in Avatar. When I saw the film I was immediately reminded of this speech.


Marian
 
Watched it again yesterday, in 3D this time. Even after reading the 100+ pages of both adulations and criticisms (some valid, some not) I still really enjoyed watching this film.

Have to agree that with watching in 3D, that while it did give a nice change in the visuals to some of the scenes, the 2D version definitely didnt suffer in the visuals department.
 
Marian, Smedly Butler is now a hero of mine. :)

This thread, tl;dr, apologies if any of the following has already been said. It's written by me, quoted from another forum some of us here go to:
Just saw this today [Monday]. Resisted in part because of the hype, but the sheer weight of numbers is impressive.

So it boils down to two things. The effects/graphics/background etc. And the story.

The whole 3D thing, as well as the realisation of Pandora, was stunningly well done. As were the effects, background detail and so on in the human base, with the computers and 3D systems - some of it we've seen in other films, but not like this. At times it really did look lie insects and leaves were a long way out of the screen, drifting just out of reach. And the world itself, with fluorescent plants and colourful wildlife, is spectacularly realised.

Now, the story. At bottom, it's the 'colonial goes native' trope, which we've seen many times before, not just in SF. You don't notice it so much as you're swept into Pandora and its ecology, but something niggles away in the back of the mind. And of course, the colonial-gone-native is up against Bad White Men. I maintain that if/when we go to other worlds, we will have hopefully have learnt the lessons of our treatment of our own indigenous species and not repeat them. My son made a good point - the whole operation's being run by a corporation that wants the huge dividends that mineral wealth can bring, so being environmentally friendly isn't high on their list of priorities. And the mercenaries just want to shoot things. So a lot of that is all stuff we've seen before. Which was a bit of a meh for me.

BUT.

It works. Obviously, it works. Think about this. Most popular film ever. A SF film. A Science Fiction Film Is The Most Popular Film EVAR. Did you ever imagine you'd see the day? In my imagination I've travelled to distant worlds, dived the deepest seas, journeyed into the furthest past. But I never thought I'd see this. And the story has a lot to do with this. It's a classic myth set on a distant world. Has something for the guys, the girls, the hippies, the military buffs, the furries, the xenobiologists, and the elders, wrapped up in that story. And it gets people in. Personally, I could have done with something a bit more complex and more about Pandora, but I think I'm in a minority, and we may well see those stories in the following films (two more apparently).

So in this I'm happy to be wrong in this, and let the crowds roll in.

Point to ponder. Star Trek reached its high mark due to a lot of repeat business from fans, but I wonder if Avatar iis getting that same kind of repeat biz. My son says he knows guys who have gone 3-4 times, but I on't know, I think it has less repeats than Trek, it just gets a lot more people in.
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In the poll I voted excellent, but would have preferred something between that and above average. Have given it the benefit of the doubt, but it was a close thing.
 
The Parents Television Council's review on "Avatar":

http://www.parentstv.org/ptc/publications/moviereviews/PTC/2009/Avatar.asp

Avatar
By Christopher Gildemeister​
Release Date: December 18, 2009​
MPAA rating: PG-13 for intense epic battle sequences and warfare, sensuality, language and some smoking​
Starring: Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Sigourney Weaver, Stephen Lang, Michelle Rodriguez​
Recommended age: 17+​
Overall PTC Traffic Light Rating: Red

​
Sex
Kissing, implied sex, brief reference to masturbation
Violence
War, mass death and destruction, explosions, intense fantasy violence
Language
“s***,” “godd***,” “Jesus,” “dick,” “balls,” “ass,” “bitch”
Behavior
Bigotry, exploitation

​
In the year 2154, an Earth corporation is mining an energy-producing ore found on the planet Pandora. Pandora’s natives, the tribal Na’vi, resent and resist mankind’s exploitative presence. To befriend and study the Na’vi, human scientists have created alien-looking bodies, or “avatars,” which are inhabited by human minds. Crippled Marine Jake Sully is embodied in an “avatar” as part of a mission to discover the Na’vi’s weaknesses and gain their trust; but as he comes to understand Na’vi culture and life on Pandora, Sully finds his sympathies beginning to change…

Language is perhaps the largest concern for parents in Avatar, with nearly non-stop use of profanity-laced speech when the human characters are shown (the Na’vi speak in a more elevated and formal manner). Avatar is also characterized, especially in its latter half, by tremendous amounts of violence, as humans make war on the native Na’vi. This involves everything from Na’vi firing arrows and throwing spears at humans, to humans massacring Na’vi with machine guns, missiles, bombs and flamethrowers, destroying their sacred lands and blowing apart the tree in which the tribe makes its home. Massive death is implied and many deaths are seen, though none are gory. There are also scenes of humans and Na’vi being attacked by the many alien animals which inhabit Pandora. Sex in the film is limited to kissing, one scene in which Sully and his Na’vi wife are “mated for life” (the female is shown straddling Sully’s lap, but no nudity is seen); and one humorous reference to masturbation: inhabiting his new “avatar” body, Sully examines the body’s hair braid; his co-worker tells him, “if you keep playing with that, you’ll go blind.” The human corporate officers and soldiers view the Na’vi as primitive, calling them “tree monkeys” and similar derogatory nicknames, and being perfectly willing to massacre as many as necessary to further human exploitation of Pandora.

Avatar represents an impressive step forward in visual effects technology, particularly in “motion-capture” techniques previously seen in The Lord of the Rings trilogy; but the film’s familiar story, despite several lessons about respecting nature and the rights of indigenous peoples, is dominated by war-time violence and a profusion of foul language. Due to the film’s violence and profanity, the Parents Television Council does not recommend Avatar for viewers under age 17.
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OMG, masturbation!!!
 
I'm surprised they didn't disapprove of the scantily clad natives -- I guess Doctor Manhattan in Watchmen outdid this film for bludity.
 
Yes, it is the "Don't play with that or you'll go blind" line when Jake discovers the weird nerve endngs in his hair. You can hear it in the background, but it is easy to miss.
 
I've seen it twice and keep meaning to see it AT LEAST once more, but every time I think about it, I figure "eh, it'll still be around next week." :lol:
 
I will be definitely be getting Avatar when it is released on dvd and Blu-Ray if there is going to be a Blu Ray edition of it because it was a brilliant movie so many things to enjoy in it.

If Cameron does make a sequel to Avatar will it involve the military wanting to ruin Pandora again or would it involve something new and exciting just wondering. Ps Avatar is a masterpiece nuff said.
 
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If I had to guess, it will involve more human characters.

It would be reasonable for there to have been one or more other ships en route to Pandora during the years that Sully's vessel was on its way. So more RDA people, scientists, military reinforcements, etc might well show up a year or two after the events of Avatar to find the base either abandoned or inhabited by the few human beings left behind at the end of the movie.

The presence of human beings and orbital support craft might also explain having parts of the sequel take place on other moons like Pandora, a possibility that Cameron has mentioned.
 
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