Cheers!
Posted on 01/01/2010 8:43:03 AM PST by Kaslin
The Academy Awards have expanded the number of best picture nominations to 10, and the buzz on Planet Earth is all about "Avatar."
Conservatives are enraged at the movie's anti-American, anti-military, pro-primitive themes, but they should understand that most spectators won't care what the movie has to say. They'll just enjoy the 3-D spectacle, fun in spite of politics. Adults ought to see it with a teenager. It's an expensive ticket that will be appreciated, and you can shape the discussion afterward.
watched it with a precocious 14-year-old who has managed to escape the politically correct didacticism of education today. He said he liked the "spectacle" and told me not to worry about the message: The political cliches are condescending and racist but easy to tune out. I asked him to explain. "The movie portrays a superior disabled white man who joins blue Native Americans who wear primitive decorations, worship a tree, and who aren't very smart. Would you rather think about that or enjoy watching dragons fly?"
Most of the reviewers haven't seen it quite that way, but this kid got closer to the mark than the reviewers who imagine that David Cameron, the director, is Barack Obama's rival for the role of Messiah. Still, there are reasons to see the movie despite its goofy plot and the ludicrous oxymoron-like criticism of the American corporations whose technological inventiveness makes movies like this possible.
It's breathtakingly beautiful. The color is magical, the flora and fauna blossom in a gorgeous electrified Eden where superstar pterodactyls fly through the air with the greatest of ease at the speed of whoosh. Luscious dragons and death-defying monsters are more backdrop scenery than story intensive. The new technology is a marvel, and the 3-D glasses have improved since the 1950s.
A dated anti-Vietnam attitude lies at the root of the thematic sensibility, but such palaver is ancient history to the young -- and you can discount it as an anachronism, like a musty something in a museum. "Avatar" is more "Wizard of Oz" than "Apocalypse Now." It's entertainment first. As the Marine drill sergeant who barks at young recruits arriving on the Planet Pandora observes, "You know you're not in Kansas anymore."
Conservatives who complain about the message should look beyond the Hollywood cliches and adolescent counterculture sensibility and instead engage the kids with lively ideas. For starters, you could ask them why the name of the planet that's the focus of the adventure is called Pandora. If anyone's forgotten the Greek myth of Pandora's Box, give Google a click and you can offer a bag of Gummy Bears to anyone who can say what remained at the bottom of Pandora's Box after all the evils of the world flew out.
For those youngsters who leave the theater believing that Americans have no respect for nature, remind them that our national parks were first preserved by Theodore Roosevelt, a Republican president. We have more than 230 million acres of land devoted to national parks, forests, and game and bird preserves, and that's not counting the zoos, aquariums and botanical gardens set aside for education and pleasure. There's an American Indian museum on the National Mall in the nation's capital.
While the movie dramatizes human greed and avarice and its director has given fatuous speeches about his feelings over the war in Iraq, nobody I talked to at the theater was there for the commentary. Once you see all the players as cartoon characters (3-D flattened to 2-D) in a predictable, unoriginal plot, you can pick apart the cliched specifics. But the technology is groundbreaking and will be a landmark in the memory of the young who see it today. The grown-ups shaping the conversation for the next generation can learn from them how new digital special effects visually transform the images of real actors into 10 feet tall skinny blue people with pointy ears and versatile tails.
Aristotle was right, spectacle is the lowest element in drama, but we live in a time when the image is triumphant and the medium is the literal message. The guiding force and deity of the Planet Pandora is Eywa, and it's impossible to believe that there but for the grace of Eywa go I. Words, characters, narratives, the rich humor of comedy and the serious conflicts of tragedy are not the innovative creative achievements of our age.
"Avatar" is an adventure story made to appeal to young men without providing a genuine hero. There's another movie up for an Academy Award, a fine war epic of American courage under fire. It's called "The Hurt Locker," and you should take a teenager to that one, too.
—I’ll stick to folks I can relate to,— Sherlock Holmes, John Dillinger, and Pike Bishop come to mind-—
Uh, Suzanne, that would be "James Cameron."
When I get a chance, I'm going to try to see "Dancing With Smurfs ;-)" at a local IMAX in 3D. Anybody have experience with these places? I MUST wear my own glasses, otherwise I'll need to "see the movie in Braille!" Is there a problem wearing the 3D glasses over Rx glasses?
Mark
David Cameron????....Try James Cameron.
Our age is not be able to often deal with the conflicts of tragedy, but The Hurt Locker may be an exception. Reviewers disagree with each other as to whether it is or is not a conservative movie, and that tells me that there may be something worthwhile to it (although I’m not presently somewhere I can easily or often see movies - no Avatar for me, either!)
I love a good flick.
I love Sci-Fi.
I love good film making.
I love innovative special effects.
But the WRITING is SO important. If the movie has even the BEST SFX in HISTORY but a crappy, agenda-driven, manipulative, wooden script, I can’t stand it.
I guess I am just a snob, but I can’t help myself.
This really isn't anything new for James Cameron. Remember that he's best known for the Terminator movies, the original being a fairly low budget movie, and he did a terrific job on that. Terminator 2 was quite a groundbreaking movie, in the arena of digital effects as well. And of course, there's Titanic
He's also well known for "Aliens" (the first of the series, "Alien," was directed by Ridley Scott.) If you recall, Aliens was all about the big, bad, evil corporation that was going to bring the little critters home for profit. And as with Terminator 2, Aliens used a huge step forward in effects to help make the movie even more entertaining.
This article mentions that this movie is a ground-breaker, and she may be right. I remember the very first time I saw "Star Wars," and was absolutely stunned from the opening on. Today the effects in Star Wars, even after the doctoring, look "quaint." So I wonder what effects will be like in another 10 or 20 years. But no matter what, Cameron's a good director, and his movies are always fun, even if they try to pass on a message.
Mark
Cheers!
David Cameron, James Cameron. Who cares who the director is, Who cares about that movie anyways
[[Conservatives are enraged at the movie’s anti-American, anti-military, pro-primitive themes, but they should understand that most spectators won’t care what the movie has to say. They’ll just enjoy the 3-D spectacle, fun in spite of politics. Adults ought to see it with a teenager.]]
Ah yes, Just go see the movie and ignore the ANTI-AMERICAN theme, and simply watch it for the visuals’- Heck- take you kids (andhope to heck they aren’t swayed by the ANTI-AMERICAN GARBAGE in the movie- as if we don’t have enough GARBAGE being shoved down our kid’s throats these days- Garbagein, Garbage out!!!). infact, after you watch the ANTI-AMERICAN movie, head on out to catch the triple X rated movie that ‘conservatives shoudl just watch for the spectacular scenary and the beautiful landscapes- watch it just for the fun of it. most spectators won’t care what the movie has to say’
Amazing 3D experience???
Isn’t that what I experience when I’m not watching movies??? Call me crazy.
What's the name of the movie and where's it playing?
Mark
You're crazy.
I’m with you. I find all this 3D business totally overrated.
Sincerely,
One Eyed Jack
It’s like “Dances with Wolves” except the Indians are blue. The whole Rouseau “Man in a State of Nature is Good” schtick.
That’s right America, keep caring more about your shallow “entertainment”, and keep supporting Hollywood by paying to see it, than about the country-maybe next time you can elect an even worse man than Hussein-yes, it’s possible-without bothering to check his credentials, record, associates, or beliefs, because you’re too busy being caught up in the hype over the latest “blockbuster” movie, or reality show hero, or American Idol. keep those priorities straight.
One of the best things that could ever happen to this country would be for the mainstream “entertainment” industry to go belly-up. Which is all the more reason that it never will. If every other industry in this country went bust, people would still be forking over outrageous prices to buy tickets for at best, stupid, at worst, anti-American movies, or culture-destroying rap “music”.
I don’t think deprogramming will be necessary. If a kid is predisposed to acting out emotionally and becomes a lifelong teenage girl no amount of “deprogramming” will have any affect. Personally I loved Lang’s Colonel character, and give me some of those weapons. The plot of the movie is hopeless, cliched to the point of parody. I predict that overseas box will disapoint because of its white liberal maternalism towards the hapless primitives.
Subtle indoctrination is an effective tool when used on the lazy and ignorant subjects.
I kind of like “Dances with Thunder Smurfs”
(Remember the Thunder Cats?)
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