Avatar (same thread new title) - Page 115

LOL what I said a few pages ago about sheep? I guess you put it more mildly here but the same thing nonetheless.

Don't try to inject religion into this discussion.

People usually choose or do what they like best.
If Avatar is played more often in HTs than The Hurt Locker, then it is logical to assume Avatar is preferred.

FWIW, it was more than a little ridiculous THL won the Oscar for BP.
THL was a moderately "good" movie and that's it.
It only won due to an anti-JC vote.

Oink, I think the difference is that THL is oscar material, and Avatar is not. Now that doesnt say that THL should have won, just that its a more logical solution. Avatar doesnt really have anything that lifts it above its blockbuster status.

I disagree.
Avatar had ground-breaking 3D and SFX and a vision of movie-making uniquely tied to one man.
Avatar had a magic that translated into the largest B.O. in history and that B.O. is a vote of "Thumbs Up" by a helluva lot of people.

Adjusted dollar oink, that whats counts when we talk history. And boxoffice, 3D and SFX shouldnt be taken into account when we talk best picture oscar. The things you listed would give the phantom menace an Oscar also.

I think people go to movies for all kinds of reasons. The bigger gauge of how well a movie is liked and appreciated by the audience, versus people just going because they've been herded along like so many aimless cattle by a massive marketing campaign and peer pressure, is how many go back for a second showing or more.

I think Avatar had, and still has, a pretty big re-watch factor. That certainly contributed to the boffo box office. And that usually means it was a pretty good movie, too.

So now its cattle. Okay. I think cattle are less offensive than sheep. Why? Because there are many who think sheep make fine companions and we don’t want to offend them. So from this point forward, lets refer to the automatons as cattle.

FYI, there are some fine looking sheep on the way to town. PM me if you’re interested. Not that I participate.

Agreed....and how many went back to see THL?



Most famously, Gene Wilder....

Do we know when panasonic will release it's death grip on the 3d bluray so we peons can buy it?

I am not even sure if you are religious, or what religion you prefer. My question was merely aimed at your disdain towards a message of better behavior.

The golden rule and the good book (or any other religious book for that matter) are examples of such "prescriptive" models, just like Avatar as a movie celebrates better behavior towards your fellow species and the environment as a whole.

Can't wait and i know many will go see it too.

Not me just bought the blu ray.

Except in a movie like Avatar, the Na'vi don't need prescriptive religious junk to respect nature and each other. When you consider how many lives were massacred by religion over the centuries, and still are, I wouldn't use these books as prescriptive models though. I'm just speaking for myself of course.

If that were the case, why do they have a warrior culture?

Well that doesn't mean one cannot piss off another every once in a while, and they have to go hunting or I don't know fight for a chick, anything. ...I'm joking but it's been some time since I last saw the film and there are details that probably escape me right now. Yet, the fact that they have a warrior culture isn't related to having a religion or not as far as I'm concerned, you don't need to have a god to defend your home.

Believe you me.. that's an age old argument: do you need a religion's commandments to be moral, or is morality and reason inherent in human nature? I wasn't promoting any religious tenet in particular, but just asking whether Robert was equally pissed off at the golden rule or a religious text that prescribes against greed, gluttony and the like.

I am just surprised at the fervor with which some people hate a film for celebrating a better lifestyle, yet at the same time are huge fans of portrayals of deeply flawed characters depicted by some art house directors' like the Coen brothers or Scorcese. It is great to show how flawed a character could be, but it's considered "Hollywood preaching" if idealized human behavior is shown. "Greed is good" is celebrated, while "respect mother nature" is considered the Hollywood elite preaching.

Agreed 100%! I like both types of films and appreciate the diversity available to us.

Actually, what I don't like is the pretense that a fictional, romanticized, idealized depiction of a primitive lifestyle is supposed to be a prescription for how people "should" behave in the real world. It's the absurdity of people tsk tsking to each other on their Ipads about the "evil industrialists" while wallowing in blissful cognitive dissonance about the fact that it was those "evil industrialists" who made their Ipads a reality in the first place (not to mention the advanced technology Cameron used to preach about the Glories of Stone Age Living).

By the way, Scorcese, et al don't portray their flawed characters as people that should be emulated. Far from it.

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Well you definitely missing the point that "Cameron was preaching" that's for sure. He didn't suggest that people should get rid of their three piece suits and don a loincloth. That is outright luducrious and sheer nonsense. What he preached was man's destruction of his environment for short term gain. And his wanton disregard for all things that stand in his way in his pursuit of those short term gains.

Exactly. Well stated.

Some people decide (quite arrogantly) that their definition of "destruction of the environment" must be agreed to by everyone else. If Cameron was really interested in engaging in a discussion about the complexities and consequences of various aspects of management of natural resources by an advanced industrial society, he wouldn't have couched the film in such simplistic, "idealized, romanticized stone age culture good, advanced star traveling culture bad" terms. That kind of Hollywood melodrama is what substitutes for actually making people think instead of emoting about "nature".

+2



A movie based on a fictitous story can only go so far in any "discussion about the complexities and consequences of various aspects of management of natural resources by an advanced industrial society."
Parables are not such a bad thing, and have been a part of human culture for eons.

No reason to make people think . . . just smack them in the face with the reality of it. The KISS principal.

You can certainly go much farther than Cameron obviously had any interest on going.



Thinking is what gives humans everything they have. I could just see some idiots saying "I favor/oppose policy X because of the way Avatar makes me 'feel'!". God forbid they should actually think instead of basing actions on emoting.

How would you have done it?


You can still have the industrial world, no need to eliminate that, it just has to retool itself so that it's good for business and good for the planet and everything on it. It's a money issue. Business doesn't want the retrofitting costs, and consumers don't want to pay for them, especially in times like these.


That encompasses practically everything in our society, and exactly where we are now. Not too long ago, before batsh*t crazy became vogue; we could talk and come to an agreement by compromising. Now...

Drop the whole "isn't it lovely to run around in a loin cloth in an idealized stone age culture" idea and come up with a story that addresses real issues in the real world.

That does not necessarily apply to Hollywood movies, which are a form of entertainment.

Therein lies the fundamental difference. I want the retooling to make sound economic sense, others say "the hell with that, I want it mandated by political fiat".

Yeah, yeah. "Hey, this movie is a Serious Essay On Environmental Issues!". "Hey, this is just popcorn entertainment!" You can't have it both ways. And if it's the latter, I SURE as hell don't want it to be the basis for how people ACT.