So, I finally screened Avatar: The Way of Water (2022, James Cameron). I must confess that I was pleasantly surprised at how much I liked it. To be more precise, I would say that for me the film is half problematic and half amazing. But since I expected the problematic part of the film – actually, I wasn’t expecting to even like the film at all – that at least part of my reaction to it is finding it amazing is surprising to say the least.
Before I get to that, let me just stress why the film is also problematic for me:
I’m not going to get into all the flaws I saw in the film, and there were many (e.g., such as not giving the reef people, the Metkayina clan, anything to do during the last battle, creating a silly contrivance to get Jake and Neytiri and their family to the reef people, the ending battle that seemed to go on forever, some of the inorganic [painful] dialogue, etc.) but rather I’m just going to site the three aspects of the film that for me are glaringly problematic:
Cultural Appropriation
First, most glaringly, and this is an issue that of course was problematic about the first film as well and has been cited by many people, including indigenous people (especially Native Americans see this site for the most recent example), is the “cultural appropriation” of indigenous cultures, especially Native American cultures. Added to that is the weirdness of how director James Cameron chooses to create a pastiche of many indigenous cultures (at least Native American, Polynesian, and Māori) and – and this is the part that really is weirdly jarring at times – modern Black culture. Any cultural appropriation, even if it is done for positive reasons, is problematic. When white (western, Eurocentric, American) individuals appropriate Other cultures for their own uses – often to exploit for one’s own self-interests – that too becomes a kind colonialism of a whole people. Moreover, often this translates into a romanticization of Other cultures, which also can be a form of dehumanization, making such representations less like authentic complex cultures than inorganic stand-ins for whatever form of exploitation the creator uses them for.
Patriarchy
Second, the film is thoroughly patriarchal through and through, making males the leaders of “tribes” and hanging on to patriarchal (toxic) ideologies, such as valorizing a “warrior” way of being. One of our most glaring problems in this country and the world is how we STILL indoctrinate our males with toxic ideologies (patriarchy, phallocentrism, hypermasculinity, sexist gender norms) — part of the root cause for so much male violence, hate, and Othering — and though this film does also deconstruct some of these toxic masculinity ideologies (creating empowered women characters, creating males who can express the full spectrum of their humanity, including emotional and nurturing expressions, etc.) it still hangs on (romanticizes, valorizes) toxic masculinity norms, such as, again, making the leaders of “tribes” males and the main decision makers, valorizing (heroizing) violence, creating scenarios to “prove” one’s manhood, and so on.
Not Really Extraterrestrials, Just Humans in Disguise
Third, the film does what so many science fiction-extraterrestrial films do, create extraterrestrials who are essentially just humans made to look like aliens. This issue is not overly problematic but it is always disappointing to me when we don’t get extraterrestrials who are truly alternative to humans!
Having said that, the film is as I suggested also amazing in some regards:
See The Film in 3D!
First, predictably, at least in its 3-D version, the film is amazingly beautiful and immersive. I found myself at times in awe of being taken away to an alternative environment, at least in terms of a world that is just so majestic and awe-inspiring. The underwater scenes are especially jaw-dropping.
Interconnected
Second and connected to the first point, the film does something quite special and profound, especially in its immersiveness, it takes us back to a time when we were truly interconnected to the natural world around us. That is, instead of being utterly disconnected to nature, instead of using nature for exploitative extraction and consumption, we see and feel what it is like to be what should be, to once again take our place as part of the natural world, experiencing the natural world as part of us, every facet of it our “relatives” (see “kincentric ecology” for more on this profound way of being in the world).
Indigenous versus Eurocentric
Third, despite the problematic cultural appropriation, I couldn’t help but also register how the film starkly sets up a progressive binary, between two sensibilities, what I will call indigenous versus Eurocentric. On the indigenous side of the equation, we get a progressive way of being that is all about the affirmation of all life forms, an interconnected relationship with the natural world (see above), and living for the health and well-being of the collective family or tribe. For this indigenous way of being, “value” is not about toxic constructs (money, material possessions, image and status focuses, etc.) but rather determined by a spiritual connection to the natural world including of course our fellow human beings. On the Eurocentric side of the equation, we get all that is toxic about this way of being or the toxic ideologies we live by, including the mercenary, predatory capitalism that only cares about wealth accumulation and profit (that vial of “amrita,” taken from a gland in the brain of a murdered tulkan starkly reflects this especially in the emphasis on this tiny vial of substance, leaving the rest of the massive carcass to waste), speciesism (standing in for the worst self/Other ideologies in our history, e.g., racism/white supremacy, xenophobia, imperialism/colonialism, etc.), and toxic masculinity ideologies (patriarchy, hypermasculinity), all of which reflect the (self) destructive nature of this (Eurocentric, western) way of being, which is our dominant way of being. In this way, the film does what science fiction scholar Darko Suvin calls “estrangement,” profoundly “estranging” us from our own toxic way of being and offering an alternative (progressive, healthy) way of thinking and being, an “indigenous” way of being. And I must just add here how it is so fascinating to me that we root for the extraterrestrials and against the humans!
Tulkan (Whale) Hunt
Finally, I just must call attention to the tulkan hunt, which is obviously a stand-in for whale hunts. This particularly disturbing thread in the film is just so important, not just because it calls attention to a particularly vile form of (capitalistic) predation but because Cameron especially calls attention to how whales are almost certainly sentient and sapient and thus should not be hunted. By making the tulkan obviously sentient beings with what should be rights, Cameron more glaringly calls attention to what should be, that our own whales (and other sentient and sapient life forms) should have rights. What is especially disturbing in this moment in the film is how the hunters even acknowledge that the tulkan may be more intelligent than humans and yet they still hunt them!! But then because the motive is profit, this is entirely believable.
All-in-all, I must admit that despite being troubled by the cultural appropriation in the film, I have to wonder if people leaving the theater will be better for having seen the film, for the message of wanting an alternative (indigenous) way of being instead of the (self) destructive, toxic one we live in now? And if that’s the case, is that enough justification for Cameron’s “cultural appropriation”? That’s a complex issue and one that I don’t have an answer for.