Review of "Avatar."
Avatar: written and Directed by James Cameron Starring Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Sigourney Weaver, Giovanni Ribisi, and Stephen Lang.
While Avatar is an amazing technical achievement the plot was basically “Dances with Wolves” in space. The film had great special effects along with 3D. I don’t know if anyone else had this experience but the 3D glasses did not work well for me until I placed them upside down and wore them. Someone probably reversed the lenses in the glasses.
The basic plot is that in the year 2154, the RDA corporation with the help of the ex marine mercenaries are trying to exploit Pandora, a moon that has a material that can be used as an energy source. The problem is that Pandora is populated by humanoid-like creatures who do not want to leave their homes. Jake Sully a crippled US Marine is sent to infiltrate the Na’vi and learn their ways so that the Marines and their corporate backers can remove them from their homes and exploit the resource. He is sent as an Avatar, which are remotely controlled genetically engineered bodies that are used on Pandora because humans cannot breathe there. Like John Dunbar in "Dances with Wolves," he is seduced by the loving and innocent ways of the Na’vi and turns against his own and becomes one of them. In the final battle scene, Sully leads the Na’vi to victory against the evil American invaders who use terms like “shock and awe” to describe their war making capabilities.
At first glance “Avatar” might be viewed as a not so subtle left wing criticism of American values and foreign policy. Those who see it this way are mistaken and here‘s why. Cameron has actually made a movie that, if anything, has ideas that are decidedly anti left. However, it is very possible this may be below his awareness level.
The hero of the movie, Jake Sully is a wounded war veteran who in the year 2154 is actually stuck in of all things a wheelchair which is 19th century technology. The reason he is still in a wheelchair is that he is a victim of a callous government run health care administered by none other than the Veterans Administration. Cameron is clearly warning us against government run health care.
Hidden in the film is the idea that it is obvious that Al Gore and his friends were successful with their global warming hysteria and that all fossil fuels have been banned on earth. Cap and trade legislation has worked and there is a pressing need for an energy source which is why the invaders are in desperate need for the resource.
Another hidden right wing message is that the marines are just trying to enforce an old left wing tradition and that is the redistribution of wealth. In this case the wealth of the Navi is the energy source. In a way the corporation is just engaged in agrarian reform as seen in the Soviet Union, China, and Cuba.
The RDA corporation needs to take over a certain area that the Navi hold sacred due to their fundamentalist religious beliefs. This can be viewed as basically just an eminent domain dispute that has turned violent all because the Na’vi won’t go along with the right to redistribute and control wealth. The film makes it clear that there are not a lot of Na’vi and they selfishly refuse to share their largess that they have not earned but sit on due to an accident of birth. Isn’t this kind of like a trust fund inheritor who does not want to pay a just inheritance tax? The mercenaries can be seen as left wing militant reformers, perhaps a Pandoran branch of ACORN.
The Na’vi as they are called are a primitive society that have one feature that Cameron must know that most liberals cannot stand, the Na’vi are all well armed. There is no bow and arrow control on Pandora.
There is another feature of their society that show that the Na’vi tend to lean a bit to the right. Church and state are not separated. The rulers of the Na’vi are religious figures and they believe in a goddess called Eywa. The head of the tribe is also the chief religious figure. Cameron clearly paints a sympathetic portrait of a people who have violated a the separation of church and state. No doubt that the American Civil Liberties Union needs to open a branch office on Pandora.
So we see that this film is actually critical of the left and supportive of many conservative positions. If only most critics along with Cameron saw it that way.