Went to see this epic James Cameron sci-fi, fantasy film over the last weekend with my wife. Saw the 3D version which you wear the glasses for. Unfortunately the theater was so full we could only find seats in the back row or the front row, so we went with the back row. Had a HUGE guy with a BIG head sitting in front of me. My neck got tired.
Aside from that, I really enjoyed the incredible computer generated graphics and special effects that made the other world (Pandora), otherworldly. The story was interesting too… how these future earth humans could link up a human with a “genetically engineered” avatar version of themselves, one mixed with the DNA of the local world inhabitants. This genetic combo produced some pretty interesting “blue people” avatars (See Jake Sully below).
Neytiri and the Avatar of Jake Sully
The biggest problem I had with this movie was the worldview that the filmmaker “preached” to me during the whole thing. It went like this…
- Humans are bad
- They destroy the environment of their own world
- They move on to other worlds and destroy those as well
- They form evil capitalistic corporations that are only interested in the bottom line
- Humans/corporations do bad things like kill innocent indigenous beings just to make a buck
On the other hand…
- Native indigenous humanoids are pure and near perfect
- The indigenous humanoids may be more technologically “primitive” but they are in tune with Nature
- Native indigenous humanoids are “spiritual” and can connect with the “spirit” of all animate and inanimate things and are therefore superior to earth humans
- They apparently can only do good
- Only humans that understand the value of these indigenous humanoids and work with and for them are noble and worth anything
- In the end the “good” guys (indigenous natives) win against the bad guys (earthlings) through the power of their superior spiritual networking with the planet.
I mean, I love a good “evil vs. good” sci-fi/fantasy epic thriller as much as the next guy… but this kind of overt anti-human, environment-worshipping, nature-spiritualizing preachiness was just too much.
It doesn’t even come close to Lord of the Rings – still the master standard in my book.
