Why Cameron Failed.

[Ashen Key]

Originally Posted by Neytiri.

If you haven't noticed after we "ruin" your country we spend billions to build it back up and give them a government that isn't a dictatorship, Ever heard of japan? They might not be allowed to build a military but there economy is off the charts.

...You also have, off-hand, Cuba, Puerto Rico, the Philippines, Nicaragua, Honduras, Iran, Guatemala, South Vietnam, Chile, Grenada, Panama, and that's before you mention Afghanistan, and Iraq. A lot of those countries aren't doing THAT well. *shrugs* It's an empire thing, it just doesn't get mentioned a lot, which is understandable, as empires tend to be a little shifty over what they actually do.

But that's partly my point (and really, I don't particularly want to get into the history of US foreign policy - it depresses me, and is mostly OT) - by making all the characters American, the movie can so easily read to those NOT in the US that this is just more of the same. So, yeah, the movie has anti-American sentiments, which could have been nicely avoided if Cameron had cast put more of an international cast in the movie.

[Neytiri.]

Originally Posted by Ashen Key

...You also have, off-hand, Cuba, Puerto Rico, the Philippines, Nicaragua, Honduras, Iran, Guatemala, South Vietnam, Chile, Grenada, Panama, and that's before you mention Afghanistan, and Iraq. A lot of those countries aren't doing THAT well. *shrugs* It's an empire thing, it just doesn't get mentioned a lot, which is understandable, as empires tend to be a little shifty over what they actually do.

But that's partly my point - by making all the characters American, the movie can so easily read to those NOT in the US that this is just more of the same. So, yeah, the movie has anti-American sentiments, which could have been nicely avoided if Cameron had cast put more of an international cast in the movie.

Yeah I'm not sure why he didn't vary the characters, I can't really see him being like "screw everyone else, all humans from now on are American" though

[Tsyal Makto]

Originally Posted by Rainbowhawk1993

Thats not the U.S. out there, Thats a private sercurty force for a Corparation and they were hiered to do their dirty work. As I recall, The U.S. has learned from it's mistake of removing indains in the 19th century. There are contries out there who do more treable things than the U.S. Now a days we try diplomicy, diplomicy, diplomicy.

Exactly. Like I said once before, if a government went to Pandora, and not a profit-seeking corporation, things would not have gone the way they did. It would've been a mission of diplomacy, not greed.

Though too, in all honestly, the recent Wikileaks dump has shown us that the world still has a lot of work to do on diplomacy. We need to learn to coexist on this planet before we drag someone from another planet into this.

And I'm not sure we're seeing America in Avatar. More than likely we're seeing the end result of 150 years of this...

[rapunzel77]

Originally Posted by Tsyal Makto

Exactly. Like I said once before, if a government went to Pandora, and not a profit-seeking corporation, things would not have gone the way they did. It would've been a mission of diplomacy, not greed.

This is true to an extent

Though too, in all honestly, the recent Wikileaks dump has shown us that the world still has a lot of work to do on diplomacy. We need to learn to coexist on this planet before we drag someone from another planet into this.

Exactly

And I'm not sure we're seeing America in Avatar. More than likely we're seeing the end result of 150 years of this...

You raise a very good point here and I am surprised it isn't discussed more. This is possibly what Cameron could be getting at. Monoculture is probably the most responsible for the extinction of indigenous cultures/languages, etc. It is all the same materialist, globalist culture that you see everywhere. I hate it. I saw it when I lived in Germany. A good example is when I was in HS. We took a field trip to a medieval town called Rothenburg. It still has its walls (granted they were partially destroying in WWII and then rebuilt). Very few cars are allowed inside. There are tons of little shops, mom and pop restaurants featuring traditional German food, etc and in the middle of this cute, quaint town, there is a stupid McDonald's. Where did most of my classmates go to eat for lunch that day?? Did they go to one of the local mom and pop restaurants to get some local flavor? No. They wanted a big mac. Ugh! I think the reason why we don't see a variety of accents and languages with the RDA in Avatar is because as you have pointed out, the monoculture took over almost completely. That is scary. We want to live together in peace and harmony while still maintaining distinctive cultures. Sadly, this "monoculture" has been produced in the U.S. and exported to most parts of the world and continues to be produced. This is why we need to resist it as much as we can.

[Rainbowhawk1993]

Originally Posted by rapunzel77

You raise a very good point here and I am surprised it isn't discussed more. This is possibly what Cameron could be getting at. Monoculture is probably the most responsible for the extinction of indigenous cultures/languages, etc. It is all the same materialist, globalist culture that you see everywhere. I hate it. I saw it when I lived in Germany. A good example is when I was in HS. We took a field trip to a medieval town called Rothenburg. It still has its walls (granted they were partially destroying in WWII and then rebuilt). Very few cars are allowed inside. There are tons of little shops, mom and pop restaurants featuring traditional German food, etc and in the middle of this cute, quaint town, there is a stupid McDonald's. Where did most of my classmates go to eat for lunch that day?? Did they go to one of the local mom and pop restaurants to get some local flavor? No. They wanted a big mac. Ugh! I think the reason why we don't see a variety of accents and languages with the RDA in Avatar is because as you have pointed out, the monoculture took over almost completely. That is scary. We want to live together in peace and harmony while still maintaining distinctive cultures. Sadly, this "monoculture" has been produced in the U.S. and exported to most parts of the world and continues to be produced. This is why we need to resist it as much as we can.

A silly dream I have is to see Mcdonalds burn to ashes some day in the future. If that doesn't happen, at least we might find a place with no fast food or other exploting corparations in the after life.

[Ashen Key]

Originally Posted by rapunzel77

You raise a very good point here and I am surprised it isn't discussed more. This is possibly what Cameron could be getting at. Monoculture is probably the most responsible for the extinction of indigenous cultures/languages, etc. It is all the same materialist, globalist culture that you see everywhere. I hate it. I saw it when I lived in Germany. A good example is when I was in HS. We took a field trip to a medieval town called Rothenburg. It still has its walls (granted they were partially destroying in WWII and then rebuilt). Very few cars are allowed inside. There are tons of little shops, mom and pop restaurants featuring traditional German food, etc and in the middle of this cute, quaint town, there is a stupid McDonald's. Where did most of my classmates go to eat for lunch that day?? Did they go to one of the local mom and pop restaurants to get some local flavor? No. They wanted a big mac. Ugh! I think the reason why we don't see a variety of accents and languages with the RDA in Avatar is because as you have pointed out, the monoculture took over almost completely. That is scary. We want to live together in peace and harmony while still maintaining distinctive cultures. Sadly, this "monoculture" has been produced in the U.S. and exported to most parts of the world and continues to be produced. This is why we need to resist it as much as we can.

Actually, I think Cameron just got lazy and very Hollywood - Hollywood is not very good at recognize that other places exist aside from the US, that in the future the US might actually not be a superpower any more. It's purely an American-centric thing, a Western Hemisphere-centric thing.

And ahaha, oh dear, re: your classmates. I do understand the sentiment, though - when I was on a school-trip to Russia, we all just soaked up the local food like anything. it was awesome and lovely (god, SO NICE)...and then, yes, when we saw a McDonalds we descended en masse because we were homesick, and it was familiar and something from home that we could trust. And I say this as someone who loathes and despises McDonalds, and who can only eat it once a year, if that. We - and we're Australian, mind you - just wanted something familiar.

[ISV Venture Star]

Originally Posted by Ashen Key

Actually, I think Cameron just got lazy and very Hollywood - Hollywood is not very good at recognize that other places exist aside from the US, that in the future the US might actually not be a superpower any more. It's purely an American-centric thing, a Western Hemisphere-centric thing.

I think it's more of an aesthetic choice, like the decision not to give the actors distractingly 'futuristic' clothing or invent any outlandish 22nd century colloquialisms. I'm happy with it.

[LOVEavatar]

He could've just forgot.... lol?

Haven't notice it until you all mentioned it. I guess it will stay to be one of those things we'll probably never get to know about JC. *continues with life*

[tm20]

this thread is a FAIL because of 1 simple fact, James Cameron never fails

[TxonTirea]

Damn it TM20. I was going to say that, I shall say it anyway.

This thread is a fail. Just because the film failed to reach a few people, it didn't stop it becoming the highest grossing movie of all time. Kthxbai. <3

[Hunter of the Glade]

Originally Posted by tm20

this thread is a fail because of 1 simple fact, james cameron never fails

Originally Posted by txontirea

damn it tm20. I was going to say that, i shall say it anyway.

This thread is a fail. Just because the film failed to reach a few people, it didn't stop it becoming the highest grossing movie of all time. Kthxbai. <3

Nuff said...

[tm20]

this thread was...

sorry it had to be done

[Human No More]

There are always a few people who lack empathy, who lack an understanding of the message. It's the same as the realistic if depressing statistic that half of the population is below average.
The people who didn't get Avatar's message are the ones who have been opposing that message for decades already.
There are still VERY few people who actually do support the RDA, and with a couple of very obvious exceptions, most of them don't like Avatar at all anyway.
I agree that it would arguably have been better if the skypeople had been worse (and if they hadn't all escaped at the end... ), but there's certainly no vagueness. The people who support the RDA are the same people who have been opposing attempts to change the world for the last few decades in favour of short term profiting.

[Isard]

You couldn't make Quarich more "dastardly" if you gave him mustachio's and a canine sidekick.

[Rainbowhawk1993]

I was going to write a paragraph on the terrable things about King leopold and the congo (He was Dutch, not american) but I think there are enought people here to prove this thread wrong. I deal with people like this on Battle.net all the time, me and my friend Will call them "Fail haters." - a person who doesn't have good reasons to hating something.