Avatar - Looking Back With Context

Ephraim Belnap

 It doesn't matter what anyone says, this was a damn good film. 

I'm not saying it was a damn good story, because the story is basic. But - every - other - aspect of this is bordering on miraculous in execution. There is still nothing as cool as watching the sweeping action scenes or the fauna of this crazy world. The CGI is still absolutely mind-blowing. The breadth and humanity of this world are still unmistakable. And the only real complaint I have when I reach the end is that I wish there was more, to explain the questions I have. 

It's worth reminding everyone that the entirety of this was filmed in warehouses, with mats, people, and puppets standing in for absolutely everything. It was the equivalent of putting million-dollar stars in an empty Wal-Mart and telling them, "you are seeing the most wondrous sights of your entire life", and getting absolutely stellar results. People complain about Marvel actors having to act with only greenscreens for background, but this was an order of magnitude sparser and an order of magnitude more impressive in its results. 

Moreover, knowing what I know now, I'm willing to give James Cameron more leeway. It's easy to be cynical about filmmaking as an audience member and write off well-worn tropes as sheer laziness, but that doesn't seem to be the case. James Cameron genuinely seems to be one of those rarest of wealthy human beings - a conservationist. 

Since 1984, James Cameron has spent a significant amount of time doing underwater exploration. He has three different documentaries about exploring ocean-floor shipwrecks, and has been an advanced certification diver for 35 years. He has given dozens of millions of dollars to environmentalist causes, and personally taken trips to indigenous peoples all over the world to both learn, and to do things like screen Avatar and ask them what they think of it. He's personally visited the deepest point on the entire ocean floor and brought back samples - something that's only been done by two other people in all of human history - all while filming the whole thing. He is an engineer, an environmentalist, a cultural conservationist, a philanthropist, and also, while making these films, has been pioneering filmmaking technology that other companies will be falling over themselves to get access to for the next twenty years, undoubtedly expanding the limit of what filmmaking and video itself can be used for. 

And yes, we can make the argument that some of these could be for show, and that we don't know all his motives. But at some point, you've gotta be willing to accept someone's actions as to some extent reflective of who they are, even if they're very wealthy. Even the wealthy ought to be judged as if they're capable of selfless motive. We ought not to discount fairness just because they're powerful. There's a limit to the amount of cynicism we can apply, and sometimes, that's because the subject is genuinely not trying to put one over you or anyone else. Sometimes - despite what we tell ourselves - powerful people can genuinely be good. It doesn't mean they're perfect, because Cameron has widely documented years of jerkassery to condemn him. But ... he seems to have been on a better roll for the last few decades. 

And looking through this lens, Avatar doesn't seem like a bloated, ignorant, Hollywood-ized bastardization of nature and Native American culture. It looks like a simple story told with the elements important to the creator. A genuine love letter to conservationism, the beauty of nature, the power of family, the dangers of the military-industrial complex, the danger and wonder of technology, and how all these things and more can co-exist! It's not a weakly-gilded retelling made to trick you into paying for something you've already seen, it's a wide-ranging tale on the complexity of existence, and how not valuing the Earth you're on could lead to your certain destruction if you're not careful. 

And all this aside, watching it again it was truly wondrous. It's the overexposure to it when it was coming out that made a lot of us turn against it. Ice cream starts to become awful if everyone around you only eats it. 

All this to say, Avatar was a genuinely fun watch, and I'm excited to see more in the sequel. They've apparently advanced things to the point that they can do underwater stuff, and considering how much James Cameron loves the ocean (see all of the above), that means we're probably gonna get some cool stuff!