This movie has the cult following of Star Wars in 1978. It looks like people are going to see it multiple times. It is visually fascinating. But I’m less concerned about the technology and more concerned about the plot and theme. It has all the earmarks of … a movie produced the the DNC. It has …
1. Scenes resembling Viet Nam footage. (As though we were in Nam for the purpose of conquest.)
2. The “bad guys” as primarily European, gung-ho types, bent on conquest and exploitation …
3. … with an American flag in the background.
4. The natives practicing a pantheism representative of native American religion.
5. No place for Christianity.
6. A naive “noble savage” view of life without profit and exploitation.
7. In the end, the Americans were forced to leave. Like Nam.
8. The people were “communal.” If they represent the opposite of imperialism, this becomes a push toward socialism/communalism (idealized communism) as the alternative to imperialism.
But to answer one of the thematic foundations of the film: Was there exploitation and evil done by imperialism? Yes. That’s history. But that is not us today. If James Cameron, the producer, thinks that European imperalists should leave and give the land back to the native Americans, I will let him be first. Let the rest of his production crew follow. At least then we will know that he has the courage of his convictions. His sentiment is otherwise empty.
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