Posted by guest blogger, BroKen.
I finally took the plunge and plunked down the ten bucks (twenty actually, since I took my wife) to enter the 3D world of James Cameron’s movie,Avatar. Most everything that could be written about Avatar has already been written. I had read reviews that said it’s plot was weak and it’s political message was offensive to the military. I think those reviews were half right. More on that later. It has about run it’s course in the theaters. There was only one other couple with us at our viewing. Still, here are my late and disjointed thoughts on Avatar.
First, my 3D glasses were smudged and my wife complained about reflections in her glasses which she found distracting. I thought the early scenes of CGI (computer generated imagery) looked just a tad cartoonish. When the action moved to the exotic planet Pandora, that cartoonish look may have continued but perhaps that is appropriate on such a strange world.
The 3D effect took a little getting used to. Thankfully, Mr. Cameron avoided assaulting the audience by throwing things out of the screen. Instead, he tried to draw us into the action. Often, the characters moved deeper into the screen as we were invited to enter into this imaginary world. I thought the brilliant colors of the lush, tropical planet Pandora were almost too much. It was as if the Amazon were cross-pollinated with neon lights from Las Vegas.
Someone described the plot as a cross between the movies Fern Gully and Dances with Wolves. That about sums it up. The plot is not very original and certainly quite predictable. So, the reviews I mentioned earlier are half right. But despite the use of phrases like “shock and awe”, “daisy cutter”, and “fight terror with terror”, military folks need not take offense at the depiction of the mercenary soldiers in the movie. The villain in the movie transcends mere trigger happy soldiers or greedy corporations. The villain is humanity itself. None of the acts portrayed in the movie are worse that what has been done by humans throughout history. The evil you see in the movie is probably the evil you see in yourself. Consider that the Communists of China curtailed the movie for fear of its inciting citizens to revolt against their policies of forced relocation. I think the best movie analog for Avatar is Independence Day, but this time we humans are the invading aliens from outer space.
Yet, the primary idea of the movie is a spiritual one. Call it “the ghost in the machine.” Ten foot, blue avatars are controlled by a reality (human) outside themselves. Robots are also controlled by humans inside. Even the planet is controlled by something beyond, yet also within. If it weren’t for the native’s worship of that planetary intelligence (as if a planet could be God) one might applaud the message of a spiritual reality animating matter. I can’t say it’s Christian, but it’s definitely not secular.














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