AVATAR Report...

POSTED BY: out2theblack
UPDATED: Wednesday, January 13, 2010 00:13
VIEWED: 25627
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STORYMARK

Tuesday, January 5, 2010 8:52 PM

Well, it's a simplified, truncated form of the movie he's been waiting so long to make. His original script-ment was rather deeper in theme, plot and character.

"I thoroughly disapprove of duels. If a man should challenge me, I would take him kindly and forgivingly by the hand and lead him to a quiet place and kill him."

OUT2THEBLACK

Tuesday, January 5, 2010 10:15 PM

http://www.imdb.com/news/ni1372717/

'...News regarding the adaptation of Fred Van Lente and Andrew Foley's "Cowboys and Aliens" has put fans of the sci-fi western source material on something of a seesaw...

According to The Daily Beast, however, there's a few details fans can count on: Favreau is on board to direct and the Dreamworks film begins shooting this July.

Of course, there's still a bit of room for speculation, with Tdb wondering if the more than $1 billion to-date box office success of James Cameron's "Avatar" might entice filmmakers to render "Cowboys and Aliens" in 3-D.'

http://splashpage.mtv.com/2010/01/05/cowboys-and-aliens-to-begin-shoot
ing-this-july-possibly-in-3-d/

FREMDFIRMA

Tuesday, January 5, 2010 11:49 PM

Alas, I must spoiler the entire bit here.

Select to view spoiler:

FYI, Two - I regarded that the Na'vi were at some point high tech to be all but a given as their environment and even themselves seemed rather clearly engineered, nature can do that, but it's messier, and as "clean", for lack of a better word, as their system was pointed straight at it.

That's why I thought reverse-engineering their biotech would be so valuable even to a boneheaded corpie, cause it was something we might have the potential to replicate even if we had to clone it.

As for Eiwa, many folk believe Earth has something of that kind of consciousness itself, but much less potent and aware, almost a distant subconscious form of it, but that's a topic for it's own thread, I think.

-F

KNIGHTREYEDER

Wednesday, January 6, 2010 4:24 AM

My first viewing caught the unobtainium silliness and it's bugged me since as well. As thorough as this film is, that name alone leaves an off tone resonance that lasts....the only blatant 'nit pick' thing I can't let go of.

He is however, forgiven since the rest is food for the imagination, a feast for the eyes and raw fun, plain and simple.

_________________________________________________
VOTE FOR OUR FAVORITE SHIP!!
http://blogs.amctv.com/scifi-scanner/2008/05/coolest-starship-tourname
nt.php

Mal's expression in the scrapyard when he first see's Serenity says it all.

STORYMARK

Wednesday, January 6, 2010 7:01 PM

If you think the name "unobtanium" is silly.... you should maybe do some research.

Short version, the element in the movie is used for room-temprature superconductors. Scientists and Engineers spent years trying to develop just such a material.

Guess what they called it.....?

"I thoroughly disapprove of duels. If a man should challenge me, I would take him kindly and forgivingly by the hand and lead him to a quiet place and kill him."

ZEEK

Wednesday, January 6, 2010 7:36 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Storymark:
If you think the name "unobtanium" is silly.... you should maybe do some research.

Short version, the element in the movie is used for room-temprature superconductors. Scientists and Engineers spent years trying to develop just such a material.

Guess what they called it.....?

I'm betting they called it something incredibly silly.

STORYMARK

Wednesday, January 6, 2010 7:42 PM

Well, the sillyness of the name is debatable. Nonetheless, it's been a word in the scientific community for a couple decades, is likely what such a substance would be called upon discovery, and was not something Cameron just made-up.

So, if folks want to be anal and say it was stupid to call something by it's name... well, like I said, they should perhaps do a little research before sounding like a fool.

"I thoroughly disapprove of duels. If a man should challenge me, I would take him kindly and forgivingly by the hand and lead him to a quiet place and kill him."

CYBERSNARK

Wednesday, January 6, 2010 9:46 PM

I also had my suspicions about where the Na'vi came from, since their anatomy doesn't match anything else on Pandora.

Every other complex life-form on the moon was shown to have six limbs. The Na'vi only had four.

-----
We applied the cortical electrodes but were unable to get a neural reaction from either patient.

STORYMARK

Wednesday, January 6, 2010 9:55 PM

Interesting observation.

"I thoroughly disapprove of duels. If a man should challenge me, I would take him kindly and forgivingly by the hand and lead him to a quiet place and kill him."

HKCAVALIER

Thursday, January 7, 2010 3:33 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by pizmobeach:
I'm a lot more critical of movies by directors that I have a great deal of respect for. Cameron, tons of respect. I think Aliens is one of the greatest Science Fiction films ever produced, he broke the mold with that film in so many ways. Since then, perhaps unfairly, I have come to expect that he might get close to repeating those heights with his following films. With Avatar he did break new ground with many very special/incredible effects, alone they are worth many viewings (I'll be buying the disk as soon as it's out). But the story and characterizations, sorry, it makes sense when you know that he had the initial ideas in the 70s, very early in his career.

@HK - I think where we might not be seeing eye to eye starts here: You said, "Where in Jake's actions in service of the native people's cause do you see his "arrogance?" I don't see HIS arrogance, - that's not my beef - I see Cameron's arrogance, I see Hollywood's arrogance, I see White Male America's story telling arrogance - ya know, it's all about them. So the white guy turns around and does good - it's the fact that it's HIS story and not Michelle Rodriguez' character's story, or any other non-white, non-male story that I'm talking about.

Hey pizmo,

Sorry if this is catching up with you too late and you've moved on. I totally understand if that's the case, but even though I've been busy with other things this week I keep thinking back to this conversation.

Mixing art and politics is always tricky, a balancing act, I think. All too often we shoot the messenger--blame the art for the culture, the artist for bringing up complex, unpleasant and unanswered questions as if he created them; blame Taxi Driver for Hinkley, Marilyn Manson for Columbine. It's particularly on these hot-button, largely intractable problems like racism, or our culture's fascination with violence, or the marginalization of anything resembling the female, or the massive "karmic debt" (if you will) of the white race--these issues over which we feel the most powerless, that we blame the artist as somehow an instigator. Surely there is such a thing as corrupt art, but I try to er on the side of the artist, try to ask only that they "hold the mirror up to nature," give me a clear picture to look at and find what meaning I can.

In the first much more combative draft of my last post, I'd asked if casting Denzel Washington in the lead would make any difference to you. At the time I thought the question was merely incendiary, but the more I read, I kinda get the feeling that casting him would make a difference, y'know? It seems like that could have really solved your problem entirely. But if Mr. Washington were cast in the lead, wouldn't the movie be pushed over the brink into some sorta "White People are Just Bad" scenario?

I think there are serious problems with western culture, serious problems with western political thinking. A lot of us folks, caught in the western system are trying to opt out. I think opting out of the system, even opposing it when we can, is a worthy story, an heroic story. I guess you'd prefer something on the order of Little Big Man or Dances with Wolves, where White Guy becomes just another schmo in the tribe. Seems Jake Sully's specific heroism is the problem. White men shouldn't be heroes in a multi-cultural story. But in my experience, white guys need to take a constructive part in the multi-cultural story more than anyone. And if he's heroic about it, well, good for him!

I find it pretty ironic, actually, that you express such respect for Cameron on the one hand, and attack his gender politics on the other. Cameron has made his career largely on two blisteringly bad-ass, grown up female lead characters in a genre (sci-fi) otherwise obsessed with male adolescent fantasy only. Heroic actions by a White Guy on behalf of an Oppressed People?

So he makes Aliens in which Lt. Ripley does all the heavy lifting, then two Terminator movies in which Sarah Connor saves the world; and h

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