So, um, about that other Avatar movie...

[starlady]

Is it just me, or does this paragraph contain some very problematic tropes stereotypes narratives statements? (I'm not sure which word is best; thoughts?)

Humans can’t breathe the air on Pandora; Jake lies in a casket-like vessel, while his consciousness, projected into an “avatar”—Vishnu-blue and nine feet tall, like the native population, the Na’vi—explores Pandora’s rich interior. It is a fantasy about fantasy, about the experience of sitting inert in the dark while your mind enters another world. Set roughly a hundred and twenty-five years in the future, “Avatar” is, like most speculative science fiction, a cautionary tale. Humans have turned Earth into a wasteland and, in their pursuit of a precious superconductor called Unobtanium, are beginning to do the same to Pandora. Jake, through his avatar, falls in love with a Na’vi princess, who teaches him to live in harmony with nature, and then he leads her people in an insurrection against the colonists. … This summer, addressing an auditorium filled with thousands of teen-age boys at Comic-Con, in San Diego—an annual convention of science-fiction, action-adventure, and fantasy fans—he [Cameron] made his identification with the fair sex complete. When someone in the audience asked about his next movie, he replied, “You know, it’s not a great time to ask a woman if she wants to have other kids when she’s crowning.”
–from "Man of Extremes: The Return of James Cameron" by Dana Goodyear

Because, you know, the natives totally need a white guy to show them how it's done, and princesses can never lead their people themselves. TRUFAX.

Comments

[inkstone]

I have been dubious about this movie ever since I saw the trailer. The natives all have braids and of course, they're harmonious with nature while also being savage and warlike when the need arises. But this is totally the first time I've seen the statement "Vishnu-blue" -- yikes!

[I can totally understand the person in the audience asking about Cameron's next movie though because that's supposed to be Battle Angel, I think, and the source material, at least, is much more interesting than this stereotypical drivel.]

[starlady]

Oo, Battle Angel.

Yeah, the article, and Cameron, seem to alternate between interesting revisions of bad genre tropes such as casting a woman as Ripley in Alien and the character of Sarah Connor and crap like this. I was saying to kindkit that later on it's revealed that Cameron hired a linguist to make up the Na'vi language based on Maori, and we were just like *headdesk*.

[inkstone]

it's revealed that Cameron hired a linguist to make up the Na'vi language based on Maori

Sigh. Of course he did.

[kindkit.livejournal.com]

But the noble savages Na'vi teach him to live in harmony with nature! Obviously the movie can't be racist! I mean, it's not as though hapless, childlike, innocent natives who live in harmony with nature are a colonialist trope or anything!

[starlady38.livejournal.com]

I'm reading the rest of the article, and in some ways it just gets worse. Like, he hired a linguist to develop the Na'vi language based off Maori? Yeah, that's completely okay...

[kindkit.livejournal.com]

*headdesk*

[starlady38.livejournal.com]

There's a lot of interesting but also skeevy stuff about women and women in Hollywood, too, which is a whole 'nother conversation. (Personally I find his referring to himself metaphorically as a woman at Comic-con troubling.)

That said, though, I'm definitely going to watch the Terminator movies now.

[maakur.livejournal.com]

"Because, you know, the natives totally need a white guy to show them how it's done, and princesses can never lead their people themselves. TRUFAX."

But of course.

That makes me want to rewatch Utena....

[starlady38.livejournal.com]

Get the DVD remaster, it's gorgeous.

[zahrawithaz.livejournal.com]

Oh no! Not this plot again! Can I tell you how much I hate the natives-living-in-harmony-with-nature thing? Don't even tell me that all the humans are white and the alien princess is played by Zoe Saldana.

And you can't be serious that this is another Ewok language thing. Head, meet desk.

[starlady38.livejournal.com]

Yes, Zoe Saldana. And the Ewok-type language is based off of Maori. Because they filmed in New Zealand.

Towards the end of the article, the writer quotes some of the derisive comments on Ain't It Cool News such as "Dances with Wolves in space" and "Pocahontas meets HALO" which I felt were apt. Headdesk indeed.