From what I'd read about it on line and in the papers, my first impression was that the new, "blockbuster" movie Avatar was just another special effects orgy to avoid. All I ran across was people raving about the film's numerous visual gizmos, whiz-bangs, and eyeball candy.
Yesterday I got my wake-up call from Kunstler -- this one's actually got real content, and what it says about who we are and where we're at will blow your socks off. Say no more, Jim: I'm there.
They say (and you know who "they" are) that art imitates life. In our own time, in this ruined world, in this confused and clueless society, living under this rotted hulk of a government, there ain't much life, so art is forced to imitate death and decay. A world, a society, and a government, all of which suck, is the hand today's artists have been dealt, and they have to change their approaches to match changing conditions.
Avatar is about humans (who are unmistakably Americans) invading a far-away planet (for "planet" read "country") called Pandora, on behalf of a giant, predatory, corrupt corporation back home, in order to steal that place's most valuable resource, a precious mineral bearing the wonderful name unobtanium. The invaders apparently need this stuff to be able to continue leading the lifestyle they've grown accustomed to back on the "homeland" planet, and will do anything to get it. That includes (of course) massacring all the nine-foot-tall, blue humanoid creatures who inhabit the place, called Na'vi, a simple and harmless race who for some reason are not kindly disposed to our intention of looting their planet.
Does any of this sound familiar? If it doesn't, you're not conscious.
I'll let Kunstler, who's actually seen the thing, post the review. After noting that the audience went wild with delight over what they'd just seen at the end of the movie, Jim says:
It seemed to me that they were applauding the sheer computerized dazzlement of the show -- but in the story itself they had just watched the US suffer a humiliating defeat on a distant planet. In the final frames, American soldiers and the corporate executives they had failed to protect were shown lined up as prisoners-of-war about to embark on a death march.
More to the point, the depiction of our national character through the whole course of the film was of a thuggish, cruel, cynical, stupid, detestable, and totally corrupt people bent on the complete destruction of nature. Nice. And the final irony was that (director James) Cameron had used theatrical technology of the latest and greatest kind to depict America's broader techno-grandiosity -- as the army's brute robotic warriors fell to the spears and arrows of the simple blue space aliens. Altogether, it was a weird moment in entertainment history, and perhaps in the American experience per se. No doubt audiences overseas will go wild with delight, too, but perhaps with a clearer notion of what they are clapping for than the enthralled masses of zombie Americans.
Nothing surprises me any more, and I don't doubt that Americans are quite capable of uncorking a standing ovation after watching themselves metaphorically get ground into the dirt like a cigarette butt.
This sounds like fun, and I eagerly await seeing it at the first opportunity.
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