tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36331360.post2164182952004339499..comments2023-10-12T05:09:46.380-04:00Comments on Guilty Displeasures: More on Avatarneilshyminskyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14745442660488961314noreply@blogger.comBlogger9125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36331360.post-49384848887589130792010-01-24T05:51:31.553-05:002010-01-24T05:51:31.553-05:00I guess for me the movie put me back in touch with...I guess for me the movie put me back in touch with my past, how people with respect for nature and spirituality were my friends and how I look for the nurture of that culture again today in a strange city. But criticism is in fact the only way to possibly pass along the flaws in storytelling and make them right at a future date---so more power to ya!Ceasehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16852602817305513997noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36331360.post-20769828506406910142010-01-04T05:05:34.528-05:002010-01-04T05:05:34.528-05:00re #6: Note that she unbraids her surprisingly sil...re #6: Note that she unbraids her surprisingly silky, Caucasian hair for the make-out scene. JakeSooly* doesn't want to go <i>too</i> native, after all! Which, I could be way off-base, but I think the idea of braids is that they make very coarse hair easier to keep clean? They seem redundant for the Na'vi, who look Pantene'd up to the max. Also: useful that a Na'vi/Hu-Manclone grows a plaited pony-tail right in the tank, there. Must have something to do with that brain-tail/nerve-ending jobbie, which: holy evolution, Batman! What the hell happens if you cut that thing off? (As you can see, I was as much bothered by the lazy/illogical design as I was by the sociopolitical clusterfuck. Hello, boring 1:1 Earth-animal analogues!)<br /><br />*How did they come up with that particular mispronunciation without seeing his name written? Those whacky Aborigines!<br /><br />The main things I wanted to say, though: I couldn't help but get some perverse pleasure out of a movie that sees a mainstream American audience cheering the pornographic destruction of contemporary American armed forces. Which is slightly undercut when our heroic white oppressor/liberator's victory hinges on him having the biggest dragon-fucking dick in town. That said dragon-fucking happens off-camera is its own story-telling catastrophe - I swear there is no way there was more than one draft of this thing.Jameshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14740669500899738381noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36331360.post-63118295407866048102010-01-03T19:50:33.625-05:002010-01-03T19:50:33.625-05:00Your blog keeps getting better and better! Your ol...Your blog keeps getting better and better! Your older articles are not as good as newer ones you have a lot more creativity and originality now keep it up!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36331360.post-29361759378314973462010-01-03T19:20:52.574-05:002010-01-03T19:20:52.574-05:00I don't think that you would necessarily need ...I don't think that you would necessarily need to differentiate - there's a moral judgment implicit (or not so implicit) in any story where the protagonist rises from obscurity to become a leader. I can't think of one where the protagonist is not, at first, outside of the culture in some sense, and where his ascent does not also provide some commentary on the stagnation/futility/immorality/malevolence of his society - the one that he comes from as well as the one that he leads - if simply because only in a profoundly wrong society could its natural leader have started at the bottom run of the ladder. (And i'm using a masculine pronoun because i'm also struggling to remember examples with a female protagonist.) So I think that the 'white becomes great leader of non-white culture' is a particular sub-genre within an older tradition that includes other sub-genres like 'poor boy becomes great leader of corrupted culture of excess' or 'pious guy becomes great leader of morally suspect culture', or even 'noble guy becomes great leader of misguided peasants and scoundrels'. <br /><br />I would also add that while the Na'vi stand out insofar as they're obviously the good guys where any examples of 'corrupted culture of excess' or 'morally suspect culture' are likely the bad guys, there tends to be at least one bit of common ground - these culture are always poised on the precipice of extinction, or at the very least stagnant and unchanging. This is why they need a liberal leader and a narrative of progress to come and sweep them up - they need to be saved from themselves (their inaction, their gradual decline) as much as they need to be saved from the enemy. It's benevolent assimilation.<br /><br />Which is a long-winded way of saying that the larger category of this particular cliché always has that kind of political potential buried within it - the 'white guy becomes leader...' trope is just one particular take on it.neilshyminskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14745442660488961314noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36331360.post-83502800375796849722010-01-03T13:36:20.235-05:002010-01-03T13:36:20.235-05:00Open question in regards to the White Guilt issue:...Open question in regards to the White Guilt issue:<br /><br />How do you differentiate between the underlying racism of "whites becoming great leaders of non-white cultures" and general storytelling cliché, where your protagonist usually has to matter and become a leader? It's been bothering me with films like Avatar and District 9 as of late.Christian O.https://www.blogger.com/profile/00444025571307204096noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36331360.post-87334978356957023672010-01-02T21:13:08.820-05:002010-01-02T21:13:08.820-05:00I figured that opening joke was a danger, but I de...I figured that opening joke was a danger, but I decided to go for it. I live on the edge!<br /><br />The Michell Rodriguez character, I must admit, annoyed less for the potential problems of her being the only non-white character amongst the "human" contingent and more for the atrocious (even by the movie's overall standard) dialogue. <br /><br />"You're not the only one with guns, bitch." I just hated that we the audience were meant to be cheering at her bad-ass lines, when the reality was that they were cringe-inducing.Jasonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13298753675007196538noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36331360.post-91112372705590120382010-01-02T17:27:46.375-05:002010-01-02T17:27:46.375-05:00And also, on the Michelle Rodriguez thing - unsurp...And also, on the Michelle Rodriguez thing - unsurprisingly, she switches sides and joins the Na'vi. Which is pretty easy to read as 'she was never one of us anyway'. So...neilshyminskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14745442660488961314noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36331360.post-75698776742458390042010-01-02T17:25:56.478-05:002010-01-02T17:25:56.478-05:00It shows a profound lack of imagination, certainly...It shows a profound lack of imagination, certainly. Alien cultures have only ever resembled Enlightenment Western Europe on Star Trek, near as I can tell. (And even then, only rarely.)<br /><br />Also, I came *this close* to deleting your post on sight - when I went to the review screen, only the first line popped up. The spam I get can be so absurd that I almost didn't notice it was a joke. :)neilshyminskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14745442660488961314noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36331360.post-13570786450928781852010-01-02T13:54:03.274-05:002010-01-02T13:54:03.274-05:00New iPhone app creates and maintains erections! C...New iPhone app creates and maintains erections! Click HERE for more!<br /><br />Ahem. Just kidding.<br /><br />Another thing that annoyed me about "Avatar" was this very notion that an alien culture has to connected to a non-white indigenous culture of some kind. I realize that it's because of the bone-headed allegory Cameron wanted to make, but it's yet another way that he establishes these cultures as "other." And then the earthlings -- who are almost uniformly white, except for Michelle Rodriguez (and I think maybe there's a black extra at one point) -- show up and are like, "Whoah, this culture is so weird and different and exotic." <br /><br />It's boggling to me that in 2009 people are still making movies that so blithely and sanguinely align "white" with "human" and "non-white" with "other." Maybe that's just my naivety. (Or is that "na'vi-tay"?)Jasonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13298753675007196538noreply@blogger.com