David Brooks in The New York Times turns his attention from America’s occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan to humanity’s occupation of Pandora:
Cameron’s handling of the White Messiah fable is not the reason “Avatar” is such a huge global hit. As John Podhoretz wrote in The Weekly Standard, “Cameron has simply used these familiar bromides as shorthand to give his special-effects spectacular some resonance.” The plotline gives global audiences a chance to see American troops get killed. It offers useful hooks on which McDonald’s and other corporations can hang their tie-in campaigns.
Still, would it be totally annoying to point out that the whole White Messiah fable, especially as Cameron applies it, is kind of offensive?
It rests on the stereotype that white people are rationalist and technocratic while colonial victims are spiritual and athletic. It rests on the assumption that nonwhites need the White Messiah to lead their crusades. It rests on the assumption that illiteracy is the path to grace. It also creates a sort of two-edged cultural imperialism. Natives can either have their history shaped by cruel imperialists or benevolent ones, but either way, they are going to be supporting actors in our journey to self-admiration.
It’s just escapism, obviously, but benevolent romanticism can be just as condescending as the malevolent kind — even when you surround it with pop-up ferns and floating mountains.
Tags: James Cameron
January 8th, 2010 at 4:33 pm
You might get a chuckle out of this, Jeffrey: http://web.me.com/pascalboogaert/Site/foto3.html
Becky
January 8th, 2010 at 7:01 pm
I can’t help but wonder – did David Brooks take issue with the first “Narnia” movie? Because while Jake seems to have become one of the Na’vi leaders by the end of “Avatar”, “TLTW&TW” showed four white people entering a similarly alien realm, becoming the most awesome beings of that place, and leading other, more ethnic residents into battle. And then they become full-fledged monarchs, without even bothering to mate with/treat as equals any of the natives. Oh, and did I mention? Those awesome white heroes were children.
How curious – a quick Google search reveals no such Brooks-penned article. Could that possibly be because the “Narnia” films come from (and are embraced by) a more Christian, socially conservative cultural milieu than Cameron’s New Age-y liberalism? Could it be that his central problem with Cameron is that he obviously doesn’t like Bush?
I’m not defending “Avatar” as a hugely enlightened cultural document – I’m not yet sure how I feel about it – I just thought this worth pointing out. :)
January 9th, 2010 at 12:01 pm
Brooks rarely comments on movies. I suspect he’s written about this one because it’s 100-times the cultural event/box-office hit that the Narnia movie was. And you’re making Brooks out to be a narrow-minded, stubborn, Dubya-loving conservative. He isn’t. He was very critical of Bush, and he has praised Obama almost as much as he’s criticized him. I happen to think he’s right about Avatar… and it’s a criticism that extends to many other stories and films.
The one thing I think he overlooks is that in Avatar, the “white messiah” does come to his wits’ end and call out to the Deity for help, so it’s really the Deity who saves the day. It’s just that most of the awesome heroics are carried out by one of us instead of the Nyteri themselves.
January 9th, 2010 at 3:49 pm
A spot-on article. I loved Avatar and will watch it and re-watch it over and over again throughout the years (hard to believe it’s already made a billion bucks), but purely for the spectacle. I was disappointed in its transparent white-man savior fable, but as a piece of delicious popcorn, it works wonders. Like that big box o’ toys you mentioned in your review, Jeffrey.
What’s most disturbing about the movie is how Sully turns his back on his entire race with barely a second thought and spends the last twenty minutes of the movie slaughtering his comrades-in-arms. The basic message of the movie seemed to be that the Na’vi loved all life, as long as by all life you mean only the life on their planet. Other kinds of life can go screw themselves.
January 10th, 2010 at 10:47 am
Gaith, interesting observation. I never thought of Narnia in that light, though I think there are differences between it and the typical Dances with Wolves/Pocahantas stories, starting with the fact that humans were in Narnia before all the other strange creatures. It is a clearly parallel to the creation story in Genesis where the Garden of Eden was created for humans to enjoy and rule over. I probably simplify too much, but that was what came to mind when I read your post. Still, I think your observation holds some merit and is definitely something I never thought of before. In regards to Brooks though, like Jeffery pointed out though, he is a middle-of-the-road political commentator so I doubt he has any right-wing agenda and it’s no surprise this is one of the few – if not the only – movie he’s ever written about.
As far as the actual issue goes, if Avatar were actually considered significant for its story or political/social message, I might be a little more critical of the racist undertones Brooks points out in the article. The fact that it is a recycled story with even cheesier dialogue than its predecessors tells me Cameron probably didn’t take it too seriously because he didn’t want his audience too. I don’t agree with or condone that type of filmmaking, but in this case I don’t think there is any widespread negative effect.
January 10th, 2010 at 5:19 pm
Well, maybe I was unfair to Brooks, in which case I apologize for my presumptuousness in reading into his politics. But while it’s certainly as simple as a fairy tale, and not great art, I agree with Dan that calling the movie offensive is going a bit far. What does “White Messiah” even mean in this context? The hero is white… until he isn’t, and he never tries to promote his “whiteness” in any form. Okay, he tames the dragon. In his non-white form.
I’d much rather get offended over stuff like Harry Potter, in which the heroes’ society hides from and assaults outsiders in order to keep their magic private, though they apparently have all sorts of powers that could end starvation, prevent wars, etc. To go after “Avatar” on ethnic political grounds strikes me as misdirected, particularly when there are so many worthier and more pressing discussions to face that don’t involve huge blue aliens. As in, what gives the mostly white Harry Potter heroes the right to enjoy their magic in private while thousands of Sudanese children starve?
As for the movie’s contradictions, I find David Denby to be much more illuminating:
“What have we got to offer them—lite beer and bluejeans?” Jake asks. Well, actually, life among the Na’vi, for all its physical glories, looks a little dull. True, there’s no reality TV or fast food, but there’s no tennis or Raymond Chandler or Ella Fitzgerald, either. But let’s not dwell on the sentimentality of Cameron’s notion of aboriginal life—the movie is striking enough to make it irrelevant. Nor is there much point in lingering over the irony that this anti-technology message is delivered by an example of advanced technology that cost nearly two hundred and fifty million dollars to produce; or that this anti-imperialist spectacle will invade every available theatre in the world.
Read more: http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/cinema/2010/01/04/100104crci_cinema_denby#ixzz0cG4xXBoo
January 12th, 2010 at 8:32 pm
While modern societies generally loads up the concept of race with lots more besides skin color, I think Brooks’ essay puts too much emphasis on race as opposed to indigeneity. I certainly agree that the movie would have been much more interesting had it provided a more well-rounded version of the indigenous society, perhaps by depicting how people who don’t follow the cultural norms are treated rather than just depicting it as Eden with teeth. However, Brooks doesn’t consider some of the real tradeoffs between an indigenous, hunter-gatherer type society versus the technology-based society of the aliens. Sure, they are stereotypes, but there are real differences in terms of how people live, look, and think in indigenous hunting-gathering societies compared to industrial-technical societies. Brooks doesn’t even consider that in his argument.
At any rate, I’m inclined to give Cameron a pass in that he was trying to introduce his audience to a whole new world; so it would have been challenging to try to show more shades of gray. I hope that the next movie starts to add some more colors–perhaps there will be groups of natives who show more interest in the off-world culture?
January 13th, 2010 at 3:27 pm
I agree with Mr Brook’s reading of the film, but if you ask me it’s a stretch to say that the multitudes dishing out their dollars for Avatar are doing so for any motive more complicated than to have a good time at the movies. This is not the right movie to analyze for its treatment of native or colonial powers. It’s a fancy cartoon and Sam Harrington is no more valid a messiah than Spongebob Squarepants. To treat him as if he is gives Avatar way too much credit.