Blue (Skin) State
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Avatar is a hit. Why? Because it's entertaining. Simple as that.
Sure, in the aftermath of the darkened screening, people might mention the eco-friendly, anti-imperialist message they perceived in the movie as a whole. But for most moviegoers, that's as far as the analysis extends. Audiences loved the action, the setting, and the triumph-of-the-underdog story. Persons who say Avatar's popularity signals a political shift are forgetting why any of us go to the movies: cinematic escapism.
Sure, in the aftermath of the darkened screening, people might mention the eco-friendly, anti-imperialist message they perceived in the movie as a whole. But for most moviegoers, that's as far as the analysis extends. Audiences loved the action, the setting, and the triumph-of-the-underdog story. Persons who say Avatar's popularity signals a political shift are forgetting why any of us go to the movies: cinematic escapism.
Aside from the political stuff, I'm personally a little sick of all the "Avatar is yet another white guilt fantasy" comments. First of all, as somebody else mentioned on some other forum somewhere, most of the people tossing that chestnut around are themselves white, and so is James Cameron; thus we have white people criticizing a white person for criticizing white people, which seems a bit ridiculous. Secondly, by the end of the movie, Jake literally isn't white anymore. If anything, he's biracial, what with the avatar body being half Na'vi and half human--and even then, the Na'vi side seems pretty dominant, with the eyebrows and the five-fingered hands being the only remaining human characteristics.
But yeah, Moviebob's pretty much dead on: sometimes a movie is just a movie.
But yeah, Moviebob's pretty much dead on: sometimes a movie is just a movie.
As a conservative (meaning mostly that I want the goverment to stay the F#$% out of my life) I enjoyed the movie. Sure it had your typical enviro friendly message, but I didn't think they tried to hit you over the head with it like some movies do. When you are a political pundit either on the left or the right you tend to view everything with an idiological point of view and they read way too much into everything. Like when SNL did the Tiger Woods skit and some group came out saying how horrible it was to make fun of domestic violence. It was just a comedy skit! Just like Avatar is just a sci-fi action movie, both sides need to let it go.
You have to keep in mind that people didn't see the movie because it could give them a new political perspective. They saw it because it looked pretty and they money burning holes in their pockets.
Myself included.
Myself included.
I don't know how or why it happened, but I've become one of those has to analyze a movie and look for subtext and metaphor. During Avatar, it was like I had 2 voices carrying on an argument in my head. One was consistently calling out the tropes that I knew were coming while shaking it's head and rolling it's eyes. The owner of the other voice was getting all smitten with the shiny prettiness of the visuals and manufactured attractiveness of the Na'vi. Avatar is the glowing apex of lowest common denominator film making.
I somehow got the impression that the Hometrees just tend to grow atop large veins of unobtainium (which, by the way, is an actual term that engineers use to describe an element/compound/whatever with all the properties that you need in order to do whatever you're trying to do), sort of like the glowing trees and all the other stuff that the Na'vi consider important.MassuguGo said:
I used to be in the Air Force, and I do remember being told that some poisons only kill you if you inhale them, which is why sometimes we'd have mock gas attacks where we only had to don a mask, rather than a complete chem suit.MassuguGo said:
It's true, the right-wing pundits just have to politicize everything. They are a bunch of sensitive little bitches who need to grow a thicker skin. It's always the conservatives who advocate what is essentially censorship.
Good article.
Good article.
The biggest hint that people are morons is applauding in a cinema.
Avatar was an ok film, and that's it. it might have lots of subtle ideals and hiden messages but it's lost in the fact that most people watching it won't care one way or the other. Quite frankly the evil humanz just made me think that someone wasn't paying attention to the script rather than trying to be subtle about corporate greed and environmental damage.
Avatar was an ok film, and that's it. it might have lots of subtle ideals and hiden messages but it's lost in the fact that most people watching it won't care one way or the other. Quite frankly the evil humanz just made me think that someone wasn't paying attention to the script rather than trying to be subtle about corporate greed and environmental damage.
Meh. Overanylization.
I'd just enjoy the movie for the fictional story it is and the entertaining visuals.
Really, there's nothing wrong with looking for political and social themes because they're often there, and it's meant to be discussed. Maybe Avatar was framed in such a way not to take a stand, but let you judge who was right and think about the issues. Maybe it was entertainment. I doubt it was political propaganda for anyone.There's a difference between looking at ecological themes in FF7 and discussing RL environmental concerns and their political aspects, and rejecting the game out of hand as it's obviously Greenpeace propaganda.But the people on the far right who ***** about Hollywood and popular films trying to shove "liberal values" down our throat in a fictional movie comes off sounding like a monkey with Downs syndrome. Then again, if they are bitching about Hollywood trying to shove "liberal values" down our throat, the monkey with Downs is probably the more intelligent being.
I'd just enjoy the movie for the fictional story it is and the entertaining visuals.
Really, there's nothing wrong with looking for political and social themes because they're often there, and it's meant to be discussed. Maybe Avatar was framed in such a way not to take a stand, but let you judge who was right and think about the issues. Maybe it was entertainment. I doubt it was political propaganda for anyone.There's a difference between looking at ecological themes in FF7 and discussing RL environmental concerns and their political aspects, and rejecting the game out of hand as it's obviously Greenpeace propaganda.But the people on the far right who ***** about Hollywood and popular films trying to shove "liberal values" down our throat in a fictional movie comes off sounding like a monkey with Downs syndrome. Then again, if they are bitching about Hollywood trying to shove "liberal values" down our throat, the monkey with Downs is probably the more intelligent being.
Exactly. Why can't people be more like you guys? Instead others decide to critizise and annalyse movies and many also try looking for messages that are not there but attempt to twist it to make it look like there might be a message. I havn't seen Avatar but from the clips and comments about the movie i can bet it does have lots of messages and hidden messages and yeah its up to us to choose to decipher them for ourselves, but can we please stop trying to make out that the messages are bad or for some other purpose that just isn't part of the films?Jaredin said:
I wholly agree with the beating over the head part, it was eye rollingly stupid, the whole movie was like that though in every message, plot point, and action scene. It was pretty and Pandora was an awesome world everything else though was a waste of my 14.50 iMax ticket.GrinningManiac said:
See, this is what I don't get about American politics - what people watch on TV and what they actually believe are 2 very different things, so why the hell do these political people try and link the 2? And even if they were linked, there's no reason why "enhanced-interrogation" in emergencies and anti-military sentiments are mutually exclusive.
Seriously, the world is a complex place, and trying to some up the best response to it politically as a) Liberal, b) Conservative, or c) Libertarian is useless. Different scenarios and events require different responses.
At least over here in the UK, the majority of us have given up believing the names on the parties; everyone is trying to be in the middle now, which probably annoys the Lib-Dems who where always in the middle and now have to share the space with the Labour and Conservatives. I just hope people aren't fed up enough to let the Nazi's in ... I mean, BNP.
I loved the movie but noticed the political message. The one about the marines being "Meatheads" i really didnt like. Any one serving in a modern armed forces has to be increadbly intelligent to survive. A third world military not so much but as you could see those Marines were pretty advanced. The way i see it the more advanced the military you are serving in the more intelligent you are going to have to be to make it.
i for one did get alot of political messages out of it, but i'm a bit left leaning so i approved of most of it plus, i tend to pay more attention to politics then most. i wonder if it might at least make a few people think a bit.
on the native vs settler thing, Avatar struck me as being the only movie i've ever seen or heard of where the aliens were the ones i was rooting for. can anyone think of any movies of that sort? i mean obviously rooting for the underdog is a classic part of cinema, but this is an interesting use of an old idea.
i'll pass on the burger btw
on the native vs settler thing, Avatar struck me as being the only movie i've ever seen or heard of where the aliens were the ones i was rooting for. can anyone think of any movies of that sort? i mean obviously rooting for the underdog is a classic part of cinema, but this is an interesting use of an old idea.
i'll pass on the burger btw
I get tired of people on both sides of the spectrum either praising or condeming a movie simply placed on its supposed "political agenda". Yes, there are political undertones within Avatar. But that is not the main point of the movie. This movie is not a Glenn Beck insanity special or a Michael Moore mockumentary. It is a big budget James Cameron masterpiece. I finally saw it today, and yes, I did see the political underones within the film. But that was not the point of the whole movie. Anyone can interpret what they see in the way that they want to see it. People saw 300 as being a blatantly rascist homage to the white male imperialism. But it wasn't that at all, it was just an action movie based on a comic book based on a real event. So much gets lost in translation, depending on what you want to see within the context of the film. I didn't go in to see a movie that belittled my political ideology. I went to see a damn good film and that is what I got. Once again MovieBob, you've made a great point. Well done man, well done.
Forgive me for I am sinning by not reading the entire thread before commenting. I really don't feel like seeing other people's political commentary, as it could just...shit storm.
I prefer being a moderate myself, as it just feels natural to look at everyone and feel depressed at how wrong they all are.
But as for Avatar, to be honest, I didn't really care about all that allegorical mumbo jumbo until the actual conclusion: no compromise, just kicking human kind back to "the dying industrialized planet they came from".
That was one big "what the fuck?!" moment to me, because the way I saw it was both species being unyielding to compromise. For the Navi, it was being so closed off to strangers to begin with, let alone trying to work out a way to get a valuable mineral without harming their sacred tree. For humans, it was wanting that mineral no questions asked because it meant big bucks.
Sure, plenty of discoveries by the scientists would have provoked any truly intelligent and successful company to look into it (trees that network together like a natural Internet, for example), but let's just forget that for the sake of hokey Hollywood.
To me, the best ending would have been "after both sides suffered heavy losses they came together in a naive but believable fashion and learned to compromise and cohabitat instead of trying to cut each other out". But no, that wasn't what happened at all. Instead, what got me was "industry baaaad. Nature GOOOOD!", despite the fact that industry is why we don't live in cold, smelly, damp, disease and vermin infested hovels anymore (unless you're in a bad neighborhood in the city). Industry may have done harm, but it's done good as well. In fact, a Hell of a lot of good.
But I don't think that was Cameron's intention. After all, without industry he'd have no job or method of doing all that deep-sea diving that he did. Still, it just felt like a bullshit ending that made me want to crush something.
Other than that, great film! If I want socio-political commentary, though, I'll give Watchmen or District 9 a viewing.
How was that, anyway? Was it actually full of good points or only enjoyable if you were, in any way, Right Wing. Either way I might rent it for my Dad and sister, who are unthinkingly Republican Conservative.MovieBob said:
I prefer being a moderate myself, as it just feels natural to look at everyone and feel depressed at how wrong they all are.
But as for Avatar, to be honest, I didn't really care about all that allegorical mumbo jumbo until the actual conclusion: no compromise, just kicking human kind back to "the dying industrialized planet they came from".
That was one big "what the fuck?!" moment to me, because the way I saw it was both species being unyielding to compromise. For the Navi, it was being so closed off to strangers to begin with, let alone trying to work out a way to get a valuable mineral without harming their sacred tree. For humans, it was wanting that mineral no questions asked because it meant big bucks.
Sure, plenty of discoveries by the scientists would have provoked any truly intelligent and successful company to look into it (trees that network together like a natural Internet, for example), but let's just forget that for the sake of hokey Hollywood.
To me, the best ending would have been "after both sides suffered heavy losses they came together in a naive but believable fashion and learned to compromise and cohabitat instead of trying to cut each other out". But no, that wasn't what happened at all. Instead, what got me was "industry baaaad. Nature GOOOOD!", despite the fact that industry is why we don't live in cold, smelly, damp, disease and vermin infested hovels anymore (unless you're in a bad neighborhood in the city). Industry may have done harm, but it's done good as well. In fact, a Hell of a lot of good.
But I don't think that was Cameron's intention. After all, without industry he'd have no job or method of doing all that deep-sea diving that he did. Still, it just felt like a bullshit ending that made me want to crush something.
Other than that, great film! If I want socio-political commentary, though, I'll give Watchmen or District 9 a viewing.