Reviewing in Briefs: James Cameron’s Avatar

So yeah, wow.

Okay, now that I’ve got that out of my system…I really want to give this film some sort of insightful, nay, scathing critique. But…I’m not really certain I can.

Yes, the plot was some kind of hybrid of Dances with Wolves and Ferngully: The Last Rainforest. Yes, the reviewers ranting about the story and overtones of white guilt have a point. Yes, the alien characters seemed like slightly hackneyed Native Americans with blue paintjobs.

But.

But, most stories aren’t really all that new, and the best stories are the ones that resonate every time we hear them retold. But, today’s American writers and audiences are lifetimes removed from the historical tragedies of the Trail of Tears, and white guilt may not be the best explanation for why this kind of story keeps resonating with audiences. But, a good creative team will draw from real-world elements to add verisimilitude and empathy, even if they may have overdone it a tad here.

We have a perennial fascination, a sense of wonder, that reveres the lost primal world and wistfully hopes to see it again. Journey to the Center of the Earth, the fascination with Arthur’s court and misty Avalon, the near-magnetic draw of Atlantean legends, even tales of Shangri-La, all invoke this reverence.

The story of natives fighting off invading cultures goes back further than the early days of America and Canada – look to the waves of fabled invasions that led to the Irish legends of the fomor, fir bolg, tuatha de danaan, and then the daoine sidh. The story of native resistance against invaders is another perennial human touchpoint, a part of our racial history and perhaps our identity. Perhaps this goes all the way back to neolithic conflict between Neanderthal and Cro-Magnon groups?

White guilt is not without its adherents in social theory, but I’m not sure I buy it without question. The basic idea, the impact on the American zeitgeist, makes sense. But on a personal level, I don’t feel terribly guilty per se. Instead, I feel regret – the awareness of loss, in the same way that I regret the destruction of the Library of Alexandria, the burning of rainforests, and the extinction of species.

Enough social theory. How about the movie?

My first impression is of awe. A group of people has managed to create about three hours of time during which I seriously believed in a plausible alien world, Earthlike but different. It’s a fully-realized place with its own geology, climate, flora, and fauna.

This is also where one of my few criticisms comes in: the alien characters, the Na’vi, don’t match the creature design of their evolutionary relatives. They have only two eyes, four limbs, small external ears, and no weird respiratory openings in the torso. Frankly, they look a lot more like something from Earth than from Pandora.

I understand that they need to be attractive, appealing, and empathetic to a human audience in order to work in a film. This is a story that, like all human stories, is ultimately about people – about us – not about aliens. Still, it bothered me that there weren’t even any vestigial similarities to tie their design to the other animals of their environment. Most creatures had six limbs, four eyes (two large, two small), no external ears, no hair, and breathing vents near the collarbones in addition to any nostrils.

This design quirk, coupled with the often-overt tendency to characterize the Na’vi as very similar to Native Americans, really pulled me out of the film from time to time. Considering the immersive nature of the storytelling, cinematography, environment, and judicious use of 3D effects, this was quite a feat of failure.

What’s to like?

Immersive use of visuals is a hallmark of this film.  Unlike the recent animated Beowulf film, I didn’t notice any point where the 3D effect was used as a pure “gotcha” moment. If you’ve seen Beowulf you’ll know what I mean – the spear-point-to-the-eyeball bit was overdone, and looked awful in 2D viewings. Here, Cameron makes use of the 3D more subtly, to create a sense that you’re there: slight shifts in depth of field and focus, in tandem with an eye for detail and good peripheral elements, combine to provide you with a sense of presence that’s really engrossing.

The story is solid, if a little uninspired, but the worldbuilding and the archetypal resonance of the story help sell it despite not breaking much new ground…for written story, anyway. This film does a better job of translating classic golden-age sci-fi novel elements to the screen than anything I’ve seen before. After seeing Avatar I’m suddenly confident that my favorite sci-fi books could translate well to the screen.

In particular, the integration of CG characters makes the Foreigner cycle by C. J. Cherryh look like a real possibility. If you’ve not read them, the Foreigner books are about a human translator and diplomat who acts as the sole human representative of a small marooned colony on a world controlled by the Atevi – aliens much like the Na’vi but with jet-age tech at their disposal. The moment where Naytiri first sees her human lover Jake in person, rather than through is avatar body, was strikingly remeniscent of similar parts of Cherryh’s novels.

After Avatar I’m also crossing my fingers that someone with a lot of directorial pull and creative prowess signs on to adapt Hyperion by Dan Simmons. It’s been optioned for film, and the sfx tech is finally available to do it right. Hyperion is epic, and needs an epic treatment or it’ll fall flat.

Highs: Epic sweep and immersive visuals combine with good storytelling for a great ride. Feels like reading good sci-fi action novels, only in movie format.

Lows: Little quirks – mainly around the handling of the alien Na’vi – hinder the movie here and there.

Score: Go see it, at least once, in 3D. This is an important movie in several ways, and an experience worth having.