Avatar and most Envirnmental Films

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

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I watched this movie today got into a debate with my friends about it, an I felt like venting in a blog.

I hate this movie, I just can't get the love this movie gets. A lot of people if not everyone I know who talks about this movie praises it and I can't see the praise.

I'll talk about the good first, visually the movie is amazing and that I did enjoy, it was a great visual work with what happens in the movie when mixing
CGI an 3-D like they did. The setting looks great when parred with it.

The bad is the story, I just think the Story is bad, not even trying to compare it to other movie, though I will at some point. The plot is really forced into this when I really think it doesn't make sense nor is the movie's message a good one.

It's really preachy about the environment how we gotta protect everything and nature down to a T. That the way of life in a city is bad and evil to everyone. How we become these terrible demons and monsters when we don't live in trees or in nature 24/7. Dances with Wolves at least had a reason for it's culture differences in the sense people didn't understand each other for a more legitimate reason. There is fear from past events and how each race has been shooting and killing each other instead of understanding the others race an culture. People want to move west and explore the land, it's not about find a rare mineral that is worth a lot of money for some reason and knowing people learned this lesson from American and even foreign history. At least in Dances with Wolves, there was limited exposure from people with the Indians of the plains from past history where there is no really reflection to look back on for that. Here, there is a ton of history about prejudice and knowing about our own environment how easy it can be to screw it up.

The nature love annoys me to no end, there is no reason a military working for a company would go this far for a mineral under a tree where another race of intelligent people live knowing how past events on earth have gone. It's plays on how humans are evil and nature is all love and peace which is such BS. Nature can be just as cruel and bad as people can be. Monkey's going on commando raids on other Monkeys, Wolves killing each other over territory, very small territory at that, animals eating their mates or their own species after they have mated.

The movie at one point hates the main character for killing an animal of the forest, despite the fact it was trying to kill him and he was working to survive like any sensible person would. Like it is a crime to hurt animals trying to kill you or even defend yourself.

There is no shades of grey it's just black and white. This is what frustrates me, the humans are just depicted as this giant race of evil people who don't give a crap about this other race here who can obvious communicate with them. The natives are pure and righteous for trusting nature and living simpler. I hate this like almost every environmental film out there, yeah this stuff sucked in history when it happened to the Indians, closest analogy I could see when I saw this movie. I get it, but I'm sick of being told the same thing over and over again about how much City folk suck. It happened in the past, it sucks, nothing I can do about it, get over it. It's not like every culture in a forest was all pure and good either in history. Some Native American tribes would hunt people down to steal their supplies and scalp them, Some Indians in South America were cannibals of other tribes, some Indians went on raids to kidnap women and young girls an put them into their tribe. Yeah they knew how to live with nature but they sure and heck weren't all nice about it either.

There is no middle ground. Ever.

Avatar starts being preachy and black/White from the start to finish. It's not subtle it's shoving the message down to where it feels like it's forcing too hard to make people feel terrible about living how they are over another way of life that is trying to play it off as the better or more "holy" way of life.

The story and message with how it was present were huge turn offs for me, even worse with the inevitable sequel where the "big nasty humans" return.

 

[Browny]

Well damn...

Call me an eco-warrior, but I disagree with this a lot...

I think the rather clear line which you seem to be missing, is the difference between need and wants. The Na'vi, just like any animal species on this world minus humans, only take what they need which by no coincidence at all, is the exact amount to maintain a perfect eco system balance.

Humans continuously exploit their technological power over nature and just take more and more while all other species suffer. savage tribes from the not so distant past may have been 'evil' by our standards, but they never engaged in behavior which killed off other species, plant or animal, for the sole purpose of asserting dominance over another. Look at sharks for example; they have the ability to destroy any living thing in the ocean, but they only take what they need. A shark is very much like humans in its total dominance of the ecosystem, but its perfectly content with eating just enough to survive and not damaging other's habitat.

IDK where I'm going with this lol, but basically Avatar isnt too preachy at all. Its kind of like an inconvenient truth, where human's behavior has all the useless extremities removed and takes us down to our bare basics where we will do anything for our wants, purely because we can, and then compares us to every other living creature on earth, which knows nothing of greed. No one likes having their 'ways' questioned and I feel thats what this movie did to you... it shows your (see; humanities) actions in a bad light and you react to defend it. Thats fine. The question is; do you accept it? if what the movie says and implies about your species is actually true, are you OK with it? If the movie lies, then why do you care? I think the case here is you know there is an element of truth to it, but dont like having your ways criticised which is fine, anyone would react the same if their lifestyle is criticised.

 

[PsychoIncarnate]

Some scientists believe the next level of evolution is abandoning organics and moving into a completely cybernetic existence.

Isn't evolution toward perfection more important than other organisms? After all, they will die in time anyway. If it leads to the perfection of ourselves, it seems like a sacrifice worthy of our cause.

 

[Dre89]

I haven't seen it but from what I've heard it was apparently classic oscar bait. Apparently Black Swan is too.

That could be why you disliked the movie. Some people get to a certain level where the themes and plots applied in mainstream movies become too simplistic.

That might not be the reason, but I know that's why I don't bother with movies like this. Once you get past the level of being impressed with anything that has had millions of dollars injected into it, you need far more sophisticated plots and themes than what most main stream movies have to offer.

 

[Deleted member]

you are aware the carbon copy of the Pocahontas/Dances with Wolves etc was chosen on purpose right? The director (Jackson?) wanted to pioneer a new way of making 3D/CGI movies and just went with a "safe" story.

personally I think the movie is a 5/10, because it gets no points for story (not any negative ones either, there just is no story) and the 3D is really annoying at times (you simply cannot look away from the directors focal point of a scene)

@Browny, what value do other species have to us other than provide meat/wool/milk etc besides a hippie "we must love nature"?
If the tree of the Na'vi was positioned above some source of food humans it would be perfectly reasonable to take it by force, but mr director just had to make the humans this "obv evil" group going after some random mineral (unobtanium, really?) with the curly mustache evil general. And of course these Na'vi are perfect in every way and their hwole planet is peacefull etc. etc.
evolutionary this whole planet is just BS, why on earth would any of these species be at peace with each other ion the first place?

./rant

 

[Falconv1.0]

Avatar is a huge pander fest. It's pathetic. There's no shades of grey, there's nothing that actually made me take the plot seriously. Hated that movie.

 

[Skadorski]

Dances with Wolves at least had a reason for it's culture differences in the sense people didn't understand each other for a more legitimate reason. There is fear from past events and how each race has been shooting and killing each other instead of understanding the others race an culture. People want to move west and explore the land, it's not about find a rare mineral that is worth a lot of money for some reason and knowing people learned this lesson from American and even foreign history. At least in Dances with Wolves, there was limited exposure from people with the Indians of the plains from past history where there is no really reflection to look back on for that. Here, there is a ton of history about prejudice and knowing about our own environment how easy it can be to screw it up.

Never saw Dances with Wolves (I really, really want to though and I even have the DVD), but I'll still try to comment on this. We (humans) didn't really know much about the Na'vi AT ALL. We knew they lived in the forest, but no clue how important their trees and nature were to them. We pulled a Trail of Tears (history repeating itself). We wanted them to move a little so we could get the mineral we wanted. When Jake and the other girl (forgot her name, she went into the Navi's forest and trained with him) told the others there were souls in the trees, nobody believed it. Why? Because the idea was completely different than their expectations of it, and without actually experiencing it for themselves they wouldn't understand the importance of it. You said we have a ton of history about prejudice, correct? That's where history repeats itself.

The nature love annoys me to no end, there is no reason a military working for a company would go this far for a mineral under a tree where another race of intelligent people live knowing how past events on earth have gone. It's plays on how humans are evil and nature is all love and peace which is such BS. Nature can be just as cruel and bad as people can be. Monkey's going on commando raids on other Monkeys, Wolves killing each other over territory, very small territory at that, animals eating their mates or their own species after they have mated.

For the mineral, I agree and disagree on. I felt like they didn't drive the importance of the mineral. They simply said a certain amount of it was worth $xxx(which seemed like an extremely small amount of money, if this were taking place in the future) and that was it. Without really talking about what it did, I felt like they were searching for something simply because it was "expensive".
However, greed compels people. If it was worth a huge amount of money or did something really important, yes we (some of us, anyway) would go after it, even killing others in the way.
Also, nature can indeed be cruel, but it doesn't go out of its way to be cruel. Humans will purposely hurt other humans simply because they can.

The movie at one point hates the main character for killing an animal of the forest, despite the fact it was trying to kill him and he was working to survive like any sensible person would. Like it is a crime to hurt animals trying to kill you or even defend yourself.

I would say this is out of context but I don't remember the scene all too well.

There is no shades of grey it's just black and white. This is what frustrates me, the humans are just depicted as this giant race of evil people who don't give a crap about this other race here who can obvious communicate with them. The natives are pure and righteous for trusting nature and living simpler. I hate this like almost every environmental film out there, yeah this stuff sucked in history when it happened to the Indians, closest analogy I could see when I saw this movie. I get it, but I'm sick of being told the same thing over and over again about how much City folk suck. It happened in the past, it sucks, nothing I can do about it, get over it. It's not like every culture in a forest was all pure and good either in history. Some Native American tribes would hunt people down to steal their supplies and scalp them, Some Indians in South America were cannibals of other tribes, some Indians went on raids to kidnap women and young girls an put them into their tribe. Yeah they knew how to live with nature but they sure and heck weren't all nice about it either.

Fair enough.

 

[FoxBlaze71]

I agree, they took things way too far. Humans do NOT need to kiss nature's *** to the extent all of the ecofreaks want us to. There are pollution issues effecting our world, but it's not reason for us to give the environment everything. It IS possible to sustain human life and the life of the flora and fauna.

 

[Shorts]

The lack of painting with all the colors of the wind made it bad.

Also, I actually enjoyed Black Swan, Oscar bait or not, it was good IMO.

 

[Browny]

It IS possible to sustain human life and the life of the flora and fauna.

This is true on one condition; the earths population is cut by a third.

Yes that means 2.2 billion people need to die, if sustainability of flora, fauna and humans in this world, are to be realised. The Matrix nailed it perfectly in its descriptions of Humans as a virus.

 

[PsychoIncarnate]

Throughout all of human history, we proved we are intolerable to outside cultures.

It's evolution.

An intelligent species would be a threat and we would NOT try and deal with them in a peaceful manner.

 

[Falconv1.0]

Yet somehow I doubt we'd do it as stupidly as the idiots in that movie.

 

[TL?]

A little late to the party on Avatar eh?

 

[Sarix]

I share your opinion on Avatar Red Ryu. God that movie was awful, it really was every 70s-90s environmental movie on steroids. Honestly a big problem in fiction is that people need to learn that the trope "Humans are Bast**ds" is pretty much a dead end plot trope that lost it's creativity after Lord of the Rings (and even then it was getting dated). The fact that other races alongside humans are shown as having a stronger moral compass is just a faux pas these days that murders any way for those races to feel realistic because they have to be paragons to viewers, unless the viewers can't think while looking at media (I don't understand these kind of people).

The hyper-liberal environmental stance is also vastly dated and really should just go quietly instead of preaching something we've been aware of. Unless writers get creative and do something like portray it from the institutions point of view instead of the hippies it's only going to become more of a dead end plot type.

 

[Luigitoilet]

Black Swan isn't oscar bait. It's trashy, pulp black comedy horror that embraces its ridiculousness. Oscar bait are films that manipulatively use their subject matter to present an empty faux-intellectual artistic theme. Said subject matter is usually based around a number of easy drama tropes or historical events. A film like Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, which hamhandedly uses 9/11 as a cheap emotional device to somehow paint an empty and vague optimistic moral message about humanity...THAT is Oscar Bait.

Black Swan is a schlocky surrealist horror film. It's a spiritual successor to Suspiria, not an insincere tearjerker or "message movie". It's also brilliant by the way and everyone should watch it.

Avatar is a generic action blockbuster. I could give two ****s about the plot. It's not really what the experience is about. You think Hollywood is going to fund the most expensive film of all time, and go with a completely revolutionary and unheard of plot?

If watching films like Avatar make you so mad, why don't you delve deeper into all of cinema? I can tell you about hundreds and hundreds of incredible artistic and intellectual films. Movies are more than just what Hollywood puts out.

And besides, it's just entertaining and a very immersive experience. It obviously has done something right if it's three years later and people are STILL whining about it. Like it or not, Avatar is much more culturally relevant than a smaller Hollywood that people love to tout as "deep thinking" and "intellectual" like Inception.

 

[Jam Stunna]

I agree with LT that Black Swan isn't Oscar bait, but it is an awesome movie that everyone really should see.

Avatar was basically "Dances with Wolves" in space, but as LT pointed out, the plot really isn't the point. It's still the only movie I've watched where I'm glad I saw it in 3D.

I'd really love to see a space movie that treats its subject matter intelligently. I don't mean intelligent in the self-congratulatory jerkoff way. I mean, what would the occupation of another planet really look like? How would the local population really respond? How would we realistically deal with that? District 9 is one of my favorite movies because in addition to being a kick-*** sci-fi shootout at points, it also brought up some ideas about what first contact might realistically look like, without beating the audience over the head with THE POINT!!!

Also, the best environmental film ever was Fern Gully.

 

[Aurane]

I hate Avatar for two reasons.

It hurt my eyes too much, and it honestly has the ****iest storyline I've ever seen, but that's just me.

*continues watching Rambo*

 

[Dre89]

That Rambo part was a joke right?

 

[Melomaniacal]

You act as if we haven't already destroyed countless cultures and landscapes in favor of industrialized society. The idea of taking a cultures life force away from them a la the Na'vi is not far from the truth at all.

 

[Dre89]

You act as if we haven't already destroyed countless cultures and landscapes in favor of industrialized society. The idea of taking a cultures life force away from them a la the Na'vi is not far from the truth at all.

Black people a stigma of having a high crime rate due their poverty and lack of education.

Let's portray the entire black race as criminals.

People here are complaining about how black and white the movie makes everything out to be.

 

[Melomaniacal]

People here are complaining about how black and white the movie makes everything out to be.

That's fine, I'm just saying **** like that has happened, and still happens. Mostly a response to "...there is no reason a military working for a company would go this far for a mineral under a tree where another race of intelligent people live knowing how past events on earth have gone," because that kind of stuff does actually happen in the real world, and still does happen, despite how much you may hear about it "over and over," and how much you really "get it."

Yes, I understand that it's not all black-and-white. I don't need to hear that.

I'm not going to bother with the first part of your response.

 

[Deleted member]

Yes, I understand that it's not all black-and-white. I don't need to hear that.

Yes we know stuff like this happens to a degree in real life. We don't need to hear that.

 

[Dre89]

Melo- How is the logic in the black race scenario any different.

And yes I'm aware of a lot of the stuff the American military does that the media doesn't show. However, there's a reason why it's obscured from the public, because the public doesn't share the sentiments of the military.

 

[Jim Morrison]

Well derp, I liked the movie, it provided a solid 2 hours of good entertainment and novelty in the theaters. I don't think I want to see the movie again, though, ESPECIALLY without iMax and 3d.

 

[Melomaniacal]

Melo- How is the logic in the black race scenario any different.

And yes I'm aware of a lot of the stuff the American military does that the media doesn't show. However, there's a reason why it's obscured from the public, because the public doesn't share the sentiments of the military.

The logic would fit if I were using that logic to draw that conclusion, but I'm not, and I don't argue with strawmans. I'm sorry if it sounded like I'm implying that because it happens, I believe we should view all industrialized society as evil because this kind of stuff has happened, but that's not what I mean to do. I'm not trying to portray all of industrialized society as evil, because all of industrialized society is not evil.

Also, I never once mentioned the American government. It's not just America, you know.

Yes we know stuff like this happens to a degree in real life. We don't need to hear that.

Do you? I mean, I know we all know about things like the Native Americans and the slave trade, but it's startling how many people have no clue about things like the Bushmen of South Africa, for example.

 

[Deleted member]

Do you? I mean, I know we all know about things like the Native Americans and the slave trade, but it's startling how many people have no clue about things like the Bushmen of South Africa, for example.

waht I read: "you're an american so you probably only know about the native americans and the african slave trade."

I mean really?
right now we have tibetans being oppressed by china, up until the late fifties pretty much every african country, India and Indonesia were all still "owned" by a bunch of european countries, and most were trying to drain those countries for every last penny they were worth (tintin in congo anyone?).
way back in the middle ages we had the crusaders. etc.

It is human nature to oppress/murder/torture a non-allied civilisation if there is anything to gain from (usually riches or territory), I know this. Don't think you're the only one seeing the evil of man or something

 

[Melomaniacal]

waht I read: "you're an american so you probably only know about the native americans and the african slave trade."

I mean really?
right now we have tibetans being oppressed by china, up until the late fifties pretty much every african country, India and Indonesia were all still "owned" by a bunch of european countries, and most were trying to drain those countries for every last penny they were worth (tintin in congo anyone?).
way back in the middle ages we had the crusaders. etc.

It is human nature to oppress/murder/torture a non-allied civilisation if there is anything to gain from (usually riches or territory), I know this. Don't think you're the only one seeing the evil of man or something

You're American?

Anyway, I don't think I'm the only one who sees the evil, and I'm fairly confident that most of the people here see it. However, I think a lot of people still have no clue that this kind of stuff still goes on today. Maybe not you, but it's pretty hard to deny that awareness (at least in America) is pretty pitiful. Does Avatar raise awareness? Probably not, but apparently it sparks discussions like this, so maybe on some level it does. Really, I guess the point is that does us knowing about it make it okay?

As for it being human nature, I think that's a pretty ridiculous statement, but I really don't want to get into a drawn-out debate on ethics. I just got out of a social/political philosophy class and I really don't feel like arguing about that more.

 

[Luigitoilet]

Why don't we talk about movies in here?

 

[Deleted member]

as in here this topic or UB?
if you mean this topic, I dunno what there would be to discuss besides peoples' opinion on avatar

 

[Luigitoilet]

i mean, i thought this topic was about Avatar and other environment films, not about vague moral one-upping eachother and ethics 101. there are hundreds of environmental movies we could talk about!

like An Inconvenient Truth! Now THAT was a freakin bore. It was like this guy who wished he was an ex-president standing in front of graphs and just talking and talking and talking. what a waste of time. Plus it was a total ripoff of Waterworld.

 

[Dre89]

Melo- The problem is that fiction that simplifies all of humanity isn't going to promote awareness.

It's like that Nickelback song that just says vague cliche things like 'we need to stand together'.

Stuff like this is basically just award bait, the audience hasn't really learned anything new.

If you want to promote awareness, you need to point out specific true examples.

Good examples would be when back in the 70s America funded Indonesia with military arms so Indonesia could commit genocide in East Timor, and the fact the media kept it quite.

Or how they developed the electrocution torture method.

One thing that turns me off American movies is that they just beat you over the head with a vague simplified point.