IronicBeet said:
Gordon_4 said:
IronicBeet said:
Right, because Dances With Wolves with blue cat people was WAY better.
Actually 'Last Samurai' is a more accurate comparison. 'Dances with Wolves', less so.
Look, Avatar was no story telling hero, which in truth let me down a little because usually Cameron is better than that. That said, I'd rather watch Avatar again than watch say, Revenge of the Fallen again.
However, for all the internet complaining that Avatar was crap etc, remember this: Cameron set out to make
his movie the way he wanted. He has lived the dream of seeing a vision to completion. It's a rare feat.
Doesn't mean he isn't a huge dick when the mood takes him though
Eh, it is an alright movie I suppose, it's probably just that all the unnecessary praise it's been receiving (Not that it didn't deserve any at all) has turned me sour to the subject.
I think all the film needed was to say or imply a kind of "the future will be Fascist" like that there had been some nuclear war an quasi-nazis had overthrown all the democracies of the west, like with Starship Troopers... that would have been better than this forced bullshit of "no, YOUR country is fascist" trope.
I mean the capitalism-is-wrong message is laid so deep in the film "mah brother was killed, just for the paper in his pocket" it just begins to grate, and the utterly contrived corporate executive that makes the Jerk in Aliens seem like Chandler Bing. The film is just so contrived in getting things to PRECISELY fall in place to give such unfair justification for Jake and the Na'vi's actions.
My main problem was the Disney ending of them all being led away in chains... bullshit, that's a fucking cop out. It's almost identical to the ending of Disney's Pocahontas.
Jake didn't unite all the warriors tribes of Pandora against the humans just to let the humans walk away. What happens - in the CLEAR real life allegory of American Indians - is when they overtake the invader's stronghold they massacre every single one of the foreign invader's that they find there.
His girlfriend should have died at Quaritch's hand, he should have been consumed with rage to murder Quaritch even after disabling him and then taken part in the massacre and then at least the film would have ended with some pathos... Jake now alone on this alien planet, both literally and figuratively devoid of his humanity and reduced to an animalistic entity. And now with an uncertain future as this massacre won't go unavenged by Earth's military forces.
Then the next film would have an interesting starting off story, instead of telling the Pocahontis story it cold tell an allegory for Gerunimo. A story of armed struggle not against merely a well armed security detail of a mining company, but a super advanced space fleet. The Na'vi would have had no chance for their lack of knowledge of human warfighting... but Jake was a Marine (retcon to be a promising junior officer)... he knows how to fight and WIN a guerilla war.
The final film in the trilogy could be an allegory for modern day Africa, the Na'vi tribes have now armed themselves with the best human weapons and have won against the outside invaders but now their planet is a wreak: being torn apart by civil war over tribal differences, disease, ecological collapse and emigration... every Na'vi who has anything positive to give leaves for Earth or some other more promising star system*. The story could follow a now old Jake, trying to unite Pandora again for a brighter future embracing technology and industrialisation to care for the exploding population (ironically caused by when humans first came and gained their trust by introducing medicine to reduce infant mortality rate).
My problem with James Cameron's Avatar is if he is going to make an Allegory of America's Native Indians then he should have based it on the REALITY, not this liberal fantasy. Fantasy on top of fantasy while retaining allegorical allusions is only deceptive and disingenuous. There is no good side, massacres and brutality committed by both sides, just the winners and the losers.
(*part of the conclusion to the "war" of Avatar 2 could be Humanity coming in contact with another massive Alien empire that like Earth is expanding out exponentially consuming more and more resources of the Galaxy. A Cold War develops between them, all of a sudden this little planet of Pandora doesn't seem so important, especially when they find it's cheaper to mine "unobtanium" from some other planet.)
