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Title Studio Gross 1 Alice In Wonderland Disney $62.7 M 2 Green Zone Universal $14.3 M 3 Shes Out Of My Leag Paramount $9.8 M 4 Shutter Island Paramount $8.1 M 5 Remember Me Summit $8.1 M 6 Our Family Wedding Fox $7.6 M 7 Avatar Fox $6.5 M 8 Brooklyns Finest Overture $4.5 M 9 Cop Out Warner $4.3 M 10 The Crazies Overture $3.7 M 11 Percy Jackson Fox $3.1 M 12 Crazy Heart Fox $3.0 M 13 The Blind Side Warner $1.6 M 14 Valentines Day Warner $1.4 M 15 Ghost Writer Summit $1.2 M 16 Dear John Sony $1.0 M 17 Tooth Fairy Fox $0.7 M 18 Alvin And Chipmunks Fox $0.5 M 19 Last Station SPC $0.4 M 20 The Wolfman Universal $0.4M SOURCE: RENTRAKBox Office Poll
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Well, DUH!!!
Didn’t anyone watch Malick’s THE NEW WORLD? Or pay attention in history class, for that matter?
But Avatar still rocked!
Now, if I can only get Bruce Willis to commit to my Robocop-on-Mars epic….
“Pay attention in history class”? Really?
Both THE NEW WORLD and POCAHONTAS are terribly inaccurate historically. Pocahontas was approx. 10 years old when she met John Smith, the two never shared a romance. She would go on to marry John Rolfe.
American pop culture has twisted the the myth into fact, and its just another bright, shining example of how little American people know about the history of our country.
Calm down!!!
I think he was just referring to the well-known myth we all grew up learning. Nobody believes a Disney film is the historically accurate truth.
Also, how many of your friends call you Mr. Fussy-Pants.
Well said James, well said. The pop culture beast along with mama media are masters in twisting tales…
Memo to James Cameron:
AVATARD: PLANET OF THE GRAPES: Poca-hotness and all the ridiculous purple people eaters should never have had tails. The animal kingdom is ludicrous — four front limbs is a biomechanical impossibility. The flora fares much better. If you take a mulligan on 90% of the critters, the Freakquel will be much better. Than you can really be BO Kong without the snickering.
Great. A bio-pedant.
Yes both “Pocahontas” and “Avatar” were cut from the same colonial love story narrative cloth. So were a lot of movies, and it’s an interesting and compelling story line, that apparently seems to appeal to James Cameron quite a bit too. I don’t think the actual story was that important in Avatar. There’s probably thousands of “passable” and even annoying scripts that would turn out to be incredible movies if they were brought to life with the awesome visual effects you see in Avatar.
dances with wolves…anyone?
Since the two cultures did NOT resolve their differences as stated in the final sentence, this evidence must be thrown out of court.
On another note, I hope people who liked Avatar will go back and check out Cameron’s most overlooked and underappreciated film, The Abyss. It’s arguably his most personal and original movie, has better suspense, action and acting than Avatar and still holds up nearly perfectly visually despite last year being its 20th anniversary. The setting and ideas in the movie are so unique that they make the movie consistently fascinating. The overall plot is a little more uneven than Avatar’s, the movie’s only weak point, but at the same time it is much less predictable. And finally The Abyss has what some consider the single most dramatic, suspenseful and intense scene in movie history with incredible acting by Ed Harris and Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio that keeps you out-of-breath and on the edge of your seat! Please check out The Abyss, Avatar fans, you won’t regret it!
It would be great if The Abyss were to finally get a decent DVD (and Blu) release.
Totally agree about the Abyss. Totally overlooked but a great time at the movies.
I can definitely vouch for that. The Abyss is indeed a great movie. And now that I think of it, even though I haven’t seen it in a long time it is one of my favorite movies. I didn’t realize James Cameron directed that because I was a little kid when it came out. In retrospect I just remember it being a very original concept and story and very suspenseful.
You are soooooooo right about the Abyss! And that scene you are talking about is off the chain, even still in 2010.
I dunno… THE ABYSS is a good film and all, but it still pales in comparison to ALIENS and TERMINATOR (the original). THE ABYSS has a sloppy third act (even with the tidal wave ending) and is for all intents and purposes CE3K underwater.
I think that so many people love AVATAR that to be “cool”, a certain section of the fanbase has to profess love for Cameron’s least successful (financially and creatively) film.
And don’t throw PIRANHA 2 up to point out how I’m wrong – even Cameron doesn’t give a shit about that film.
Day-umm!.
Never saw POCAHONTAS. Are there really this many parallels?
filmklassik
SO TRUE. I wish Hollywood would spend more on good storytelling (the foundation of any GOOD film) and less on expensive graphics. I laughed at every plot event in Avatar and at one point, started singing “Color of the Wind” from Pocahontas… Alas, Hollywood doesn’t actually care about movies being “good”….
I can’t agree less. This remix was the bomb, er, the nuclear remix to any story just like it. visuals were stupendous. Now, if we could only get rid of the ‘riley’ character. terrible. Sigourney sucked. the vine bikini was really sad, not that anyone wanted to see her nude.
So what? How many screenplays come from other sources? Shakespeare has been ripped off for years in Hollywood and so what? Really, this is LAME. STFU, you’re just jealous.
Agreed! Virtually all of Shakespeare’s works were based or heavily influenced by others, including Ovid, Plautus, and Plutarch. There is strong evidence that Shakespeare didn’t even write his stuff and manipulated other’s works. To accuse Cameron of appropriating work is silly. Movies have always succeeded best as a vulgar entertainment. Cameron has touched the public’s nerve as no one else has in recent memory and that is a kind of genius.
Lots of great works, in many different media, have been “inspired” by earlier works. The test is whether the newer work brings in something original, something worthwhile that wasn’t there before.
The point of this gag, which you both seem to have missed, is that “Avatar” seems to have failed in this regard. Making the Indians ten feet tall and blue doesn’t really cut it.
Of course, it also helps if your “inspiration” isn’t already careworn.
Cameron has succeeded in touching the public with an original work. It is something that has never been seen before because of its unique visualization. “Writing” and “dialogue” aren’t as important in film as one thinks. The imagery of great films like THE GODFATHER, LAWRENCE OF ARABIA, all of Kubrick’s work, THE WILD BUNCH, THE SEARCHERS, and myriad other classics transcend the plot and dialogue. More critics speak of the deep focus photography in CITIZEN KANE than the overlapping dialogue. Can anyone outline a plot in THE GODFATHER or 2001? Studies have indicated that the written or spoken word account for around five percent of the communication in theatrical media. The mood and power of VERTIGO is completely visual. Why have powerful filmmakers like Spielberg, Lucas, and Zemeckis put so much effort in new ways of visualization? Quibbling about the ’story’ of AVATAR misses the power of Cameron’s achievement completely.
No one is trying to “accuse Cameron of appropriating work”. We are accusing him of being a cheap hack with a flat and utterly LAME script!!
I found out long ago that Cameron had his head up his ass when accepting the Golden Globe he talked about Titanic being an important historical movie about a terrible tragedy. WTF? Did he not realize that he had made a ROMANCE movie?! This is the same idiot who fought against having words put to the theme song for Titanic –which without that Celine Dion song, I don’t think the movie would have had half its audience.
Calling Cameron a ‘cheap hack’ is silly. Many TITANIC movies had been made but none captured the public’s attention like his. AVATAR has broken new ground in imagery. Writers tend to ’see the script’ when they watch movies and ignore the fact that movies are primarily a visual medium. Many of these critical posts appear to be written by angry and frustrated writers. Many people who see AVATAR completely immerse themselves in the imagery and ignore the story. This may not be a bad thing. The movie is beyond criticism at this point.
@maggie – Avatar had a story? Really? I was so busy thinking “this is soooo pretty” to notice.
Seriously, I HATED, HATED, HATED Titanic. I was afraid that Avatar would be that cloying, melodramatic and just plain stupid. I was expecting Jar-Jar on a sinking starship ridiculously in “love” with the most undesirable Gungan that ever lived and not dying fast enough. I had no intention of seeing this because while, I also thought the Abyss was a wonderful film, I thought Cameron had lost his mojo somewhere. Even with the good reviews it took me a week to go see it and I am usually at an event film opening night. With such low expectations I was pleasantly surprised. Now I have to rescreen Pocahontas to see just how much of a rip-off it is. I like raccoons.
Thank god someone finally pointed out the obvious: Pocahontas’s story was stupid and derivative, too!
There’s a 1.5 billion dollar elephant in the room and someone thinks they found a mouse. Better start figuring out what Cameron did right than dwelling on how full of holes and flawed you think the movie is.
Bingo.
Well said, sir.
Just saw the film. The theater was packed to capacity. It let out at nearly 1AM to applause.
I enjoyed the film. Sure the story was simple. But in a world where you can get ridiculously convoluted action films, it was refreshingly simple. But the special effects were outstanding. And no one can stage action the way Cameron can. No one.
This is just stupid bullshit that Nikki shouldn’t have even posted. Why not post a proper box office analysis for the weekend and show how Avatar will be #1 again with another slight drop from last weekend?
This movie will do well, and it merely reflects on the nature of people as a whole. I wont watch it because I’m not entertained by tricky special effects, I guess I’m one of the last people on earth with an active imagination.
The days of great storytelling are long behind us when recycled simplistic plotlines reserved for Disney films are jazzed up with CGI and sold as entertainment for adults.
I think that entertainment should be more than just pictures on a screen. Good entertainment should make you think, feel, listen, learn, and in turn develop yourself.
LOL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UdIIqoDakHU&NR=1
Yeah, and Avatar lifted the same 9/11 references and War on Terror references from Pocahontas, too! Or maybe not. And John Smith was in a wheelchair, just like Jake Sully, too, and had this dual existence, right? I mean the films are almost exactly alike…in the same way that Up and Gran Torino are exactly alike. Surf’s Up and Cars had the same story. Avatar and Pocahontas have one similar storyline, and both are great movies, but Avatar works on a level that is amazingly visceral and primal. This is a remarkable movie.
Exactly. This story has been told countless times. It’s merely a new take. The haters simply can’t just let it be. People love the movie and it’ll soon be the biggest movie of all time. And don’t be surprised if this wins Best Picture because this is exactly what a Best Picture should be. Big, like Return of the King before it, Gladiator, Ben Hur, etc. So haters just go on hating, it’s not going to derail Avatar for one moment!
Hmmm…I was actually expecting more haters since it seems nearly everyone who posts on this forum are jealous wanna-be’s.
I don’t think anyone is seeing Avatar for the “story”…….
All I know is, maybe the storyline was a little predictable, but I was completely caught off-guard at one point in the movie by a feeling of absolute and startling spirituality, and I don’t mean tree-hugging-type agitprop. I just was suddenly aware of a sense of soul coming out of Cameron’s vision. Go ahead and laugh, but I had to hold back tears.
I feel you my friend… I was also both grinning/laughing in excitement and adventure, and crying in anguish and beauty of the story. Who cares if the story’s old, coz it’s timeless.
Very funny! Not a surprise. We all knew Avatar’s main ideas have been told before many times.
But it doesn’t really matter. You can do the same thing with just about any Romantic Comedy.
Formula for a Romantic Comedy: Boy and girl meets…They fall for each other…The romance grows…There is some conflict that tears them apart close to the end of the movie…But then one of them (usually the man) does something cute to win the other one back…
You can pretty much say that every movie has stolen ideas or parts of other stories.
Oscar smear campaign. I love awards season!
James, you are a douche.
i am so lucky to have seen this story through avatar, i feel sad for ppl who watched disneys cartoon lol
“Never saw POCAHONTAS. Are there really this many parallels?
that’s why he has the number one movie and one of the lowest imdb.com ratings for a mega creator. Or was that Mega man, oops.
filmklassik”
This is why you only send in the first 30 pages of your script.:)
Never give them a crisis point or great ending.
Pocahontas was great, Vanessa sang the Color of the Wind.
But I wish they would do a markup of Fern Gully, the machine, the sacred tree, the big people, the little people. THE FORREST.
You got to give it to Cameron
He made Alien 2 from Bannon’s Script, but the rest of his films
really show his creativity.
It must be the water in Kapuskasing.
The Abyss, while I loved that film was Voyage to the bottom of the sea with a little Titanic.
Rambo 2, well we know where that came from.
Titanic- he had plenty of source material to back up his project.
True Lies- well there was James Bond with a little of Walter Mitty.
The only original thing you could say is the Terminator series but if you take a little Sarge from the GI Joe (G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero” (1983) and add a little Silver Surfer. You get a robot from the future with a silver undercoating. You have to hide what you take, really you do.
Well, we know where he got those ideas.
Yeah, Terminator was completely original. That’s why Harlan Ellison sued JC, and WON.
Cameron admitted in testimony that he stole the whole thing from Ellison’s “Soldier” and had to add Ellison’s name to the credit of the film and take out full page ads in Variety and the Reporter apologizing. Cameron goes ballistic whenever anyone mentions harlan Ellison’s name in his presence.
I give him all the props in the world for knowing how to make a billion dollar movie, but James Cameron has never put an original thought on paper, and if the creators of Fern Gulley decide to sue (and have the resources to do so), don’t be surprised to see their names added to the credits of AVATAR as well.
they did the same thing time ago with harry potter!
http://i.techrepublic.com.com/blogs/61074_harrypotterstarwars.jpg
They do it with lots of stuff, but the Avatar/Pocahontas one is absolutely spot-on.
there always be similarities with every movie (completely new) that is released…the truth is both movies nothing have to do with each other in its real story, how it ends and the the things they defend…and unlike pocahontas avatar has amazing visual that can really jaw drops anyone;)
oh and btw, i can do that same thing with “A New Hope” and the tolkien book…
Avatar was great, but they should use the real eyes of the actors as they speak the lines and mix them with the digital. The phony eyes make it seem like a cartoon
Ditto what Rip It Up said. Just about any film that comes out has sim ilarities to other works like a revenge story, a redeeming story or little guy overcoming obstacles and beating the big guy.
The change is usually the settings (westerns, modern, future) and tweakings of the characters.
Bottom line is Cameron makes it better, more interesting and entertaining.
And if the film has no story how come it has sparked so much debate on reasons for war, conservancy and the way indigenous people have been treated.
Just stop it with all the hate and accept JC as your master
i don’t think avatar has “sparked so much debate” on any of those things. it was a fun time but let’s not overreach here.
If Disney was concerned they would have had their legions of lawyers all over FOX. They all do it, it’s the final product that matters. No one really seems interested in this, except maybe here.
Nice to see common sense prevail over another stupid attack by a nimrod.
Hello, this is Hollywood! $1.2B as of today! Look, there haven’t been any new stories since the Greeks. I enjoyed ‘Avatar’ immensely, though the story didn’t cover anything I hadn’t already seen. But it hit all the right beats, was very well acted and directed—and the effects were amazing. If I ride a fantastic new roller coaster, isn’t it still a roller coaster?
Do the Pochontas people really think their film was so original. Isn’t this the basis of all white man comes to save the darkies (purple in this case) movie.
Loved Avatar though
Except, except — Cameron is a plagiarist of record, having been caught red-handed stealing the story for the first Terminator from a short story by Harlan Ellison. Ellison threatened to sue, the production company (Hemdale, I think) paid him a bunch of money and added a credit on the film “acknowledging the works of Harlan Ellison.”
My thought walking out was, when will the Republican response be released? Yesterday’s NY Times had an opinion piece by – guess who !! – David Brooks – complaining that the film followed an anti-American, anti-capitalist, anti-anti, see this and the terrorists win diatribe. I think every time they call it the party of Lincoln, Abe dies again somewhere in some alternate universe.
How come so many of you liberals can’t get a paragraph out without peppering it with lies? Does it stem from the sense of desperation that comes as you grow up and learn your ideas can’t work, which means you have to lie more and more to yourself and to others to avoid having to admit you’ve been wrong? Or do you just figure it worked out pretty well for your liar-in-chief Clinton and it seems like a good strategy for you? Whatever the reason, lying inevitably becomes second nature to the seasoned liberal, coming as naturally and effortlessly as breathing, as you evidenced here.
Absolutely nothing you claimed was in David Brooks’ article was in there. As a conservative, I would have been angry if it was, so I felt I had to check out the article and see what went wrong. Instead of the made-up nonsense you spewed forth, it did nothing but analyze Avatar as an example of the “white messiah” plot, which he argues is condescending to non-white races. An interesting, intelligent and insightful point that LIBERAL writers have also made! The only thing I would change in his thesis is the race aspect, to industrialized vs. primitive cultures. Because I think you could see the same plotline among any race, for example, an advanced Asian society contrasted with a more primitive one.
The article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/08/opinion/08brooks.html
Eric. S’s point in his second paragraph is accurate, though Mulhern’s point was not so horribly overstated as to require the vehemence of the “correction.” But the first paragraph (”liberals always lie”) is rather nuts. Conservatives love to try to hide their pure selfishness behind a fake, supposedly superior view of reality and human nature. If they’d stop with the conservative selfish junk, perhaps human nature would have a chance to improve a bit?
As Mr Propp found back in 1928: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladimir_Propp
Hard to believe this beat out the likes of such original works such as The Dark Knight, The Transformers, and Pirates of the Caribbean
Did you just call Transformers original??? Maybe the cartoon.
In Michael Bay’s wet dreams, he’s James Cameron…
I think you missed the irony in JWD’s comment.
Regarding the Abyss, yes, a great film. I’m puzzled, though, it seems like a large percentage of Cameron’s work is NOT available in high quality disc formats. Where are the BluRay versions of The Abyss, True Lies, Aliens, and Titanic? Even a decent quality DVD version of The Abyss and True Lies would be nice. Is there a reason why Cameron’s work (other than the Terminators) is treated so shabbily on disc?
Hilarious!
LMFAO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
@ari
Wow! I can’t believe idiots like you still adhere to the whole “Shakespeare didn’t really write those plays” belief. Even his contemporary critics that bashed him back then referred to his works as “Shake-scenes”. Any credibility you might have had went out the window with that. Fucking Plebian.
I merely mentioned that there are doubts about Shakespeare’s (Shakspere’s) authorship and even his existence as we are led to believe. Some of the doubters include Charlie Chaplain, Orson Welles, Charles Dickens, Freud, Henry James, Walt Whitman, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and many, many others. I guess Mr. joe g considers them all idiots. There are NO contemporaneous comments about ‘Shakespeare’s’ works. Virtually nothing is known about his life but for a few legal documents wills, etc. and none explain anything about his authorship. His notoriety emerged many years after his death. Everything written about his life is speculation. It may be that a man named William Shakespeare existed and wrote what is attributed to him but it will never be proven. There is no historicity there. Anyway, who cares. The work exists and Ovid was better.
Truth in humor…
Avatar…shitty story, great time at the movies anyway.
I dare any directer to have taken avatar and created even half the masterpiece that James Cameron did. This movie unlike titanic did not have a real life trajedy aspect to get ppl to see it. Unlike lord of the rings return of the king Avatar didnt have two movies to prelude it making people wanna see it. Avatar got to this level purely because of the fact that it was an amazing masterpiece that people talked about causing others to want to see this movie. Great job James Cameron! Fantastic movie and completely original vision!
I absolutely give Cameron kudos for his “vision” which he does like no other. But original? Hardly.
Wow, some of you need to get a sense of humor. It’s just a funny bit. Nobody can take away from Avatar’s amazing success. No need to be so defensive. Who doesn’t think the screenplay was the weak point? That’s not being a hater, that’s being a realist.
Putting up this obvious mock up page is nothing more than trying to stir up some controversy because it sells. This magnificent film stands on its own as an historical achievement that will stand on its own in the annals of the film industry for years to come. The bar has been lifted!
About the whole Pocahontas thing, regardless to how many parallels there were between story plots (which btw, Disney completely distorted Pocahontas’ historical story anyway) Avatar, was by far outstanding and will be remembered because of how a simple story line can be turned into a visual masterpiece.
Phenominal job Cameron
“Eric S.” (why don’t you use your name Eric, your FULL name?)
Regarding “caligulahadahorse’s” observation of your “vehement response” being overstated, but saying you ARE accurate that “nothing Mulhern wrote is in Brook’s piece” well, let’s just read a little of Brook’s piece, shall we? With credit to David Brooks, NY Times columnist and Republican geek extraordinaire, defender of Iraq war, which was based on lies (are you so dumb, Eric S. as to STILL be arguing THAT?).
I suggested, in a kind, of, you know, HUMOROUS way, that I KNEW coming out of the theater (I thought it was AWESOME, Cameron is a weak writer, but a tech genius), there would be some ramped up right-winger bozos feeling angry and defensive about the pot line of the movie being indicative of American crushing of indigenous people, and the excesses of the military industrial complex.
Now, read what Brooks wrote, below, and please, tell me that’s not EXACTLY what he’s being defensive about. Bullshit. Please.
But the TRUTH is SO THREATENING to the right-wingers, they FREAK out! Boy, can they DISH it out, but are they COMPLETE PUSSIES when it comes to eating shit and owning up to electing, then re-electing, the DUMBEST PRESIDENT IN AMERICAN HISTORY – TWICE!! Now, dumb, I can live with. Reagan was no rocket scientist. Dumb – AND getting tens of thousands of people, many of them complete innocents, killed, by lying, violating the constitution, taking NO rsponsibilty for what you’ve done, then letting your Vice President shoot his fat, ignorant mouth off throughout the first year of your successor’s administration? THAT pisses me off. Get the fuck over it Eric S.
Did YOU serve? IF so, thanks. Seriously. I didn’t serve. Except on a sit-com. And plays. And films. Came of age, 21, in ‘81, wanted to be an actor, closest I came was signing up for the draft, via Carter’s order of all American 18-21 eligible males, after Russia invaded Afghanistan, in case we countered and needed more than the volunteer military. Never did, so, I never served. My nephew will be in Helmand province – Marine Lieutenant – in a couple months. I support the military, my father served during Korea, and his older brother’s unit in WWII spent more time “on the line” (front line combat) – 198 straight days – than any other unit in the war. So, cool it with the chicken-hawk bullshit that is the hallmark of YOUR boy, coward George. Check this link out to see the UNBELIEVABLE hypocrisy of the Republicans being “tougher on national defense” by the simple LISTING of WHO served and WHO didn’t in the Bush years:
http://74.125.93.132/search?q=cache:WRsekFUhmgIJ:www.awolbush.com/whoserved.html+bush+administration+chicken+hawks&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us
I LOVE that bullshit. “Democrats are WEAK on defense!” Hmmm. WWI? Woodrow Wilson – President (Democrat). WWII? FDR, Truman – President (Democrats), Korea? Started under Truman, (Democrat), handed off to Eisenhower, (Republican), who wisely, got the fuck out of there. Vietnam, started under Kennedy, (Democrat, who already lost one brother in WWII, then had his PT boat CUT IN HALF by a Japanese destroyer in WWII, swam HIMSELF with a severely damaged back, to an island a couple miles away, got help from the local inhabitants, who went out with boats and rescued the other men from his boat, brought them back to the island and hid and fed them till they could flag down an American warship), who handed it off to LBJ, (Democrat), who went right down the shitter by pouring HUGE amounts of men and resources into Vietnam, then, got handed off to Nixon, Republican, who ended up limping out, WAY too late, “with honor.”
The DEMOCRATS are “soft on defense?”
Are you fucking INSANE?
Here’ Brooks:
The formula also gives movies a little socially conscious allure. Audiences like it because it is so environmentally sensitive. Academy Award voters like it because it is so multiculturally aware. Critics like it because the formula inevitably involves the loincloth-clad good guys sticking it to the military-industrial complex.
Yet of all the directors who have used versions of the White Messiah formula over the years, no one has done so with as much exuberance as James Cameron in “Avatar.” “Avatar” is a racial fantasy par excellence. The hero is a white former Marine who is adrift in his civilization. He ends up working with a giant corporation and flies through space to help plunder the environment of a pristine planet and displace its peace-loving natives.
The peace-loving natives — compiled from a mélange of Native American, African, Vietnamese, Iraqi and other cultural fragments — are like the peace-loving natives you’ve seen in a hundred other movies. They’re tall, muscular and admirably slender. They walk around nearly naked. They are phenomenal athletes and pretty good singers and dancers.
The white guy notices that the peace-loving natives are much cooler than the greedy corporate tools and the bloodthirsty U.S. military types he came over with. He goes to live with the natives, and, in short order, he’s the most awesome member of their tribe. He has sex with their hottest babe. He learns to jump through the jungle and ride horses. It turns out that he’s even got more guts and athletic prowess than they do. He flies the big red bird that no one in generations has been able to master.
Along the way, he has his consciousness raised. The peace-loving natives are at one with nature, and even have a fiber-optic cable sticking out of their bodies that they can plug into horses and trees, which is like Horse Whispering without the wireless technology. Because they are not corrupted by things like literacy, cellphones and blockbuster movies, they have deep and tranquil souls.
The natives help the white guy discover that he, too, has a deep and tranquil soul.
The natives have hot bodies and perfect ecological sensibilities, but they are natural creatures, not history-making ones. When the military-industrial complex comes in to strip mine their homes, they need a White Messiah to lead and inspire the defense.
Our hero leaps in, with the help of a pack of dinosaurs summoned by Mother Earth. As he and his fellow freedom fighters kill wave after wave of Marines or former Marines or whatever they are, he achieves the ultimate prize: He is accepted by the natives and can spend the rest of his life in their excellent culture.
Cameron’s handling of the White Messiah fable is not the reason “Avatar” is such a huge global hit. As John Podhoretz wrote in The Weekly Standard, “Cameron has simply used these familiar bromides as shorthand to give his special-effects spectacular some resonance.” The plotline gives global audiences a chance to see American troops get killed. It offers useful hooks on which McDonald’s and other corporations can hang their tie-in campaigns.
Still, would it be totally annoying to point out that the whole White Messiah fable, especially as Cameron applies it, is kind of offensive?
It rests on the stereotype that white people are rationalist and technocratic while colonial victims are spiritual and athletic. It rests on the assumption that nonwhites need the White Messiah to lead their crusades. It rests on the assumption that illiteracy is the path to grace. It also creates a sort of two-edged cultural imperialism. Natives can either have their history shaped by cruel imperialists or benevolent ones, but either way, they are going to be supporting actors in our journey to self-admiration.
It’s just escapism, obviously, but benevolent romanticism can be just as condescending as the malevolent kind — even when you surround it with pop-up ferns and floating mountains.
I was just waiting for Ripley to hijack one of the battle mechs and open a can of Whoop Arse on the attacking troops, sadly this did not happen. This would have set the movie apart from Pocahontas for sure. They had a real nice song at the end, sounded like a Celine Dion impersonator. We always have “Aliens” though!
Wonder if “1941″ would be any better in 3D…
I loved Avatar, but it is just another story of how colonialist greed takes precedence over indigenous peoples rights to their land, resources and culture. Yeah and is does look like a ripoff of Pocahontas, what else is new?
boy meets girl, boy loves girl, boy loses girl, boy works to get girl back, boy gets girl back.
Anyone?
So the heck what! Avatar was still an AWESOME movie, the graphics were GREAT and there was EXCITEMENT from beginning to the EXTRA LONG end. Stop hating!
What do you mean? Avatar was factual. It was historically accurate as far as I remember.