Did you really think it was about oppressive humans against eco-friendly aliens?
In 2009, when the first film came out, it wreaked havoc like no other. The sequel, which released in Hong Kong on the 14th of December sent even more shockwaves through the system. So what is it that makes this film so impactful?
Well, for starters, there are political undertones scattered around like nobody’s business. James Cameron clearly declares that it is, indeed a political film, “Avatar is a science fiction retelling of the […] colonial period in the Americas, with all its conflict and bloodshed between the military aggressors from Europe and the indigenous peoples. Europe equals Earth. The native Americans are the Na’vi.” He adds that it’s “not meant to be subtle.”
But it’s not just linked to the Europeans and the Native Americans. Saritha Prabhu of The Tennessean writes that it also draws parallels with the Western invasions, like the colonisation of India, East Africa, or Hong Kong, and how they “loot the weaker power, all while thinking they’re doing a favour to the poor natives,” because they appear “uncivilised”. The first film especially met a lot of criticism from the far-right because of its apparent “Anti-American”, “Anti-Imperialist”, “Anti-Colonial” message. Cameron’s response was notable: “I’m happy to piss those guys off. I don’t agree with their world view.”
These worldviews are universal. They’re what keep our history under wraps. As George Monbiot of the Guardian asserts, “Europe was massively enriched by the genocides in the Americas; the American nations were founded on them.” The symbolism of Avatar to show the victimisation of the Red Indians, he claims, “is a history we cannot accept.” He compares it to the Holocaust, and how if the Nazis had been successful, it might’ve been pushed under the fridge like everything else. We’re taught in history classes today that many of the Western powers had the opportunity to prevent the Holocaust; or at least reduce its scale, but since there was a worldwide hatred of Jews, they only did as much as they felt was necessary. Of course, “The people of the nations responsible – Spain, Britain, the US and others – will tolerate no comparisons, but the final solutions pursued in the Americas were far more successful.” Still, the world has changed quite a lot in the last ten years with more respect and attention given to the untold, suppressed stories as they begin to come out.
Naturally, James Cameron did this with an American lens, making clear pointed references throughout the films to the atrocities wreaked in Vietnam and Iran and how it is this heavy sense of entitlement that forces them to bulldoze through forests and take what they believe is rightfully theirs. He claims that “we can't just go on in this unsustainable way, just taking what we want and not giving back.” Avatar: The Way of Water specifically presents that the colonisers will not rest until they get what they’ve been fighting for.
However, the films also face criticism from the other side. Dozens of critics accuse that there is a white Messiah/saviour complex at play here. A white saviour complex is the descendant of white superiority. It’s the idea that coloured or non-white people cannot protect themselves with their own skills and that they need a white saviour who possesses this superiority that allows him to protect them. It’s still widely prevalent, taking shape in humanitarian crises and the Western world’s responses. Clear, potent examples lie in the Vietnam war or the Afghanistan crisis. In the first Avatar film, a white human named Jake Sully has to save the Na’vi from the invaders on Earth. David Brooks of the New York times asserts that the Na’vi 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."
Red Indian activists such as Autumn Asher BlackDeer claim that they’re “tired of hearing Indigenous stories from a white perspective [...] we could tell our own stories.” A Maori activist, Cheney Poole, also claims it is “just another example of the same very upfront and apparent romanticization of colonisation.” This is why so many people think that rather than actually helping the cause, Avatar is quite racist. Another notable thing Brooks of the New York Times said on the topic was that it created a “two-edged cultural imperialism,” painting the stereotype that “illiteracy is the path to grace” and “white people are rationalist and technocratic, while colonial victims are spiritual and athletic.” It’s these generalisations that make anything racist; conforming everybody to one single idea. Cameron did say, though, that he took the help of indigenous people when making The Way of Water because he believes that “The people who have been victimised historically are always right.”
Nonetheless, political themes aside, there’s another key message that is put forth throughout the movie. Earth is dying. It’s even part of one of the dialogues in the film. And even though this might seem like the most obvious theme of the film with the glorification of the beautiful, eco-friendly Pandora, it’s still quite relevant. The humans want to take over Pandora because it could be the next Earth. I think Ben Child of The Guardian puts the significance of this best: “Pandora is a heightened, hyper-real cipher for our own beautiful world and the Na’vi are the environmental activists battling against corporate greed and shortsighted ignorance. Can we, too, slip on an avatar skin and go flying through the floating mountains on a path to enviro-enlightenment?”
Given that the search for other Earth-like planets has already begun, it’s clear that Avatar may as well be our future, since the progress of climate change activism is now moving ever so slowly. The first film actually released during the Copenhagen Cop summit, and according to Rupert Read of The Guardian, it was “widely recognised as a failure. Thirteen years on, we have just had the damp squib of Cop27, agreeing in principle to compensate the global south for loss and damage from the escalating climate more-than-emergency, while also in effect heading towards more loss and damage through ever-higher climate-deadly emissions.” The films have clearly been released at apt times on purpose. But I believe that we are actually making progress, especially with the recent news about the “net energy gain” from the nuclear fusion reactor as announced by the US Department of Energy on December 13th, 2022.
Other than the political and environmental undertones, there are some clear and obvious themes surrounding family and water, especially in the new film. According to Chris Lambert of FilmColossus, water is used in the film as “a sombre lesson about the realities of life [...] We’re all part of this giant system. Sometimes we benefit from it, sometimes we’re the victims of it. But the system is larger than all of us.” This resonates with the theme of family as well, in which the children both cause problems and also find solutions, fitting into the natural cycle of things. Another theme which is actually prevalent in many movies is the internal conflict between the past and the future. As Tasha Robinson of Polygon asserts, “it’s particularly notable as a theme in The Way of Water because so many of these characters are in denial about who they were, who they are, or what they want. And so many of them spend the movie veering back and forth between choices, taking action and then either second-guessing or retracting it, or just holding back on choosing altogether.”
Altogether, the films presents to us that we need to pay more attention to the untold stories of our past. We need to accept our history, no matter the light it paints us in, and continue to teach this to future generations so our world can become a better place.
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