On Sunday I went to see Avatar. Yes I know, I am probably one of the last people in the UK to see it! I saw it in 3D and I thought it was fantastic. The film touched and moved me in many ways – as funny as that sounds. I loved the Special effects, the computer generated imagery. I loved the story, the scenes, the actors, the casting. There is precious little about that film I didn’t love. I felt really emotionally attached to it. I felt like I could visit Pandora myself and run alongside the Na’vi myself.

Now don’t worry, this isn’t turning into a film critic, but I do warn that if you haven’t seen the film and are intending to go and see it, you might not want to read further as there maybe spoilers (I’m not sure what’s actually in the trailers to this film but I imagine most of the story is within the trailers anyway).

I feel that Avatar has so many special messages it can share. I think the main one is environmental but also links to our historical background of claiming land for ourselves and ousting the native population for our own personal gain. I still wonder what right we have had to go and take these lands that may be rich in minerals or materials we needed and destroyed the lands of the indigenous peoples. As a civilisation we have conquered the world. We went to Australia, New Zealand, across the ocean and ruined the cultures there. We enslaved people on their own soil; we destroyed their sacred spaces and fed them our Christian lies. And that’s what is taking place in Avatar. Humans have their eye on something that will be profitable to them, the Na’vi are in the way so they must be moved or be killed. It’s something the echoes across time and I believe will be something that will continue to echo into the future. But can we change? What if space exploration comes into it and we do discover somewhere like Pandora? Will we have changed our ways by the time that comes or will be as we were? Barbaric right down to not caring if the natives are in the way?  

I like science fiction films as a glimpse of what our culture envisions for ourselves in the future, and they also scare me. Clearly with story lines like Avatar it is unlikely that we as a people will ever evolve culturally beyond a state of what we already know. Seek what is worth it, destroy what we don't know and what we are scared of, or what is different. 

We as a people are a destructive bunch. Through cultures or our own environment. Another theme I got across in Avatar was that of nature. The Na’vi are a very pagan based people with physical bonds to nature as well as their spiritual ones with Ewya, their deity. And I find their connections beautiful. Like what I would want my own connections with Gaia to be. But once again, mankind marches in destroying this beautiful place for their own personal gain. Ignoring whatever creatures might live there, plants and trees.

I find mankind’s interaction with Pandora in Avatar a mirror image of what is happening to our own planet. We are killing it. Slowly but surely Gaia is suffocating under our hands pillows of toxins. Yes, our planet is heading in the right direction with fighting this but are we too far gone? I, and others, have left Avatar with hope that this will spark some form of note with people that “hey, this is what we are doing to our own planet, if I feel this way about man destroying that planet, why can’t I feel that way about my our own?” Because we have gone too far. With all the pollutions and cities and towns that have taken over our Earth why should we change things? Will another power station cause that much difficulty? Or another runway at Heathrow? One which will uproot people from their homes all to line some pockets of some corporation.

One other thing I noted from Avatar was the power of community. If people come together we can achieve the impossible, no matter what stands in our way. China has banned Avatar in 2D because they fear that it will strike home to people and cause them to go question their government. I hope it will encourage people to stand up for what they believe in. If it is wrong to not let the government and corporations get away with it! Unfortunately in China, for anyone who does this, the penalty is unjust. Tiananmen Square – Tank man. A single man who stood up for his rights. No one knows who this man is or was. No one knows if he is even still alive.

I felt that there were several other themes in Avatar that are just as important as these. To write about them all I’d be here forever. I just hope that if you have seen Avatar I hope you took one of these things away with you – that you can see that our world may have been like that – and is now destroyed by our hands. Both in culture and in environment. And we are the people to stop it. We are Na’vi. This is our land and mankind is destroying it. I hope we can all stand up and fight for our world, our beliefs and someday, I hope we win.