My Favourite Movies: Avatar

I remember being completely blown away by this movie long, long before I picked up on any controversy about it. As an ‘event’ I hardly think it’s been surpassed or even possibly equalled since (actually having just seen Jupiter Ascending I’m starting to think that Hollywood has actually lost the ability to make these kind of movies). When I watched it again over the weekend I was actually surprised how powerful a narrative it still is – even after seeing it multiple times and knowing the story backwards.

For those of you recently returned from another planet or a long stretch in prison the story goes something like this: Jake Sully (played superbly by Sam Worthington) is a paraplegic combat vet who happens to be the twin brother of a PhD scientist scheduled to work on Pandora, an alien world famed for its rich deposits of Unobtainium (great name), who is killed by a mugger. Already large sums of money have been spent building an alien body for his brother so he’s offered the job – the price is getting his legs and his life back. Initially looked down on as a ‘jarhead’ Sully quickly becomes a friend of the native Na’Vi and after much trial and tribulation is adopted as one of their own – that’s a very long story cut very short but it’s late, I’m tired and you probably know all this already. Needless to say things are not all roses and candy. The Na’Vi are living directly over a massive deposit of Unobtainium and have to move. No dice, of course, which means force needs to be applied and what was a low level conflict turns into full scale war – if you can call it a war when helicopter gunships face bows and arrows. Sully joins the natives (as a SME – subject matter expert) and teaches them how to fight back effectively helped by his strangely close association with the planet wide intelligence (Gaia by any other name) and his even closer association with Neytiri the clan chiefs daughter (in CGI – played by Zoe Saldana).

Inevitably that very rough synopsis really doesn’t do the film justice. For one thing it’s visually stunning. The world of Pandora is amazing. It’s no surprise that people have volunteered to go there if only the place really existed. The rendering of the Na’Vi (in both senses of the world) is fascinating to watch. Obviously based on Native Americans and other indigenous peoples across the globe they rang true in just about every sense – both alien and ‘human’ at the same time. I admit that I became very fond of them. Most of the rest of the humans – apart from the scientists and especially the alien ‘anthropology’ team – where the bad guys. None more so than Colonel Quaritch (played brilliantly over the top by Stephen Lang) who thinks nothing about wiping out the locals whilst sipping his coffee.

I suppose thinking about it, rather than just being overawed by the whole thing, the controversy just had to come out. I can certainly see why those on the Right hated it. It shows rapacious Capitalism in stark and brutal contrast to the ‘green’ blue people. The contrast couldn’t have been greater. Then, of course, there’s the ‘problem’ (not that I saw or see it as such) of an indigenous people being aided and ultimately saved by an outsider – a white male no less. There are many reasons why I never saw this as anything more than a standard storytelling device (used countless times down the ages) but the most obvious are that he’s an expert in the people they’re fighting so is really useful to have around, He’s a warrior and will earn the respect of a warrior culture because of that and it’s obvious that he’s deeply disgusted by what his own species has done to their planet – which he dramatically states as ‘killing their Mother (the Gaia thing again). Avatar is one of those movies that you can read a lot into. You can take it as a straight up action SF flick and enjoy it, or you can see the deeper meanings and enjoy it even more. Either way this is a great and ground-breaking movie. It does worry me a little bit that there’s a sequel coming (in 2017 I think) and that it will do for the original what the two Matrix sequels did for that ‘franchise’.

Oh, and I just have to mention one of my favourite actresses Michelle Rodriguez as Marine pilot Trudy Chacon who must have had a lot of fun making this film. It shows in every scene she’s in and she steals nearly every one. I do love that woman!