James Cameron’s greedily expensive and minimally expansive Avatar is filled with Big Ideas that are tissue-paper thin. Set on another planet some years in the future, the movie delivers a thundering indictment of colonialism (of people), exploitation (of natural resources) and militarism that is old news, frankly, to anyone who’s seen a Western from Hollywood’s heyday. Much more interesting are the questions that Avatar unwittingly and unintentionally provokes about mainstream movies.
Avatar, in part, is a pretty transparent critique of the U.S. occupation of Iraq. Thanks to its armada of truly impressive special effects and a tidal wave of publicity — but especially because it peddles alternative-universe fantasy rather than gritty reality — more people will buy tickets to Avatar than will have seen all the other Iraq- and Afghanistan-related dramas combined, from Jarhead to Battle For Haditha to this year’s The Hurt Locker, The Messenger and Brothers.
American audiences have repeatedly demonstrated their unwillingness to confront the war in theaters (and everywhere else, for that matter). Should we applaud the distancing effect of 3-D, computer-generated characters, creatures and landscapes that allows or perhaps invites moviegoers to face military scenarios? Or should we be concerned that audiences might confuse video-game visuals for the reality of boots on the ground and bombs in any bag?
Ultimately, Avatar isn’t a true science-fiction film — one that brings some imagination to bear about future societies and civilization, utopias or dystopias — but a metaphor for a current situation. Setting a metaphor in space, even at a cost of $300 million, isn’t vision; it’s a copout.