I went to see Avatar because I had heard the visuals were something to behold. Other than that I didn’t know anything about the film coming in.

This was the first time I had seen a movie in 3D. I am about as cheap as they come, but I would definitely recommend paying a few dollars extra for 3D. The visuals were spectacular. The vibrant and colourful world created by director James Cameron was awe inspiring. Seeing beautiful tree seeds floating down onto your lap was spine tingling. Dirt would splash in your face. Arrows would be right in front of your nose. The facial features of the CGI characters is very realistic, from their skin, to their teeth. It felt like I was actually on the planet of Pandora. I wanted to stay forever.

The special effects are really out of this world, but what blew me away about the movie was the storyline. It was a story about human history and the future of the human race. Indigenous humanoids called Na’vi live on the planet Pandora. It is a world similar to earth, but the trees are bigger and the species are a mix of animals and dinosaurs. The horses have more legs, there are flying dragons that the Na’vi travel on, and the Na’vi are significantly taller than humans and have blue skin. The Na’vi are based on indigenous cultures here on earth before European contact and have a profound respect for Pandora and it’s species. Every living thing on Pandora is sacred.  

Things turn drastically worse when humans from earth find that an abundant energy supply in the form of a mineral named unobtanium is located in a giant sacred tree of the Na’vi. A corporation from earth called Resources Development Administration (RDA) is determined to mine the unobtanium with trucks that are larger than those currently in the Alberta tarsands. If the Na’vi will not surrender or offer their land for trade, then RDA will remove the Na’vi by force. Since the Na’vi don’t value anything the humans have to offer, the human use force. The corporation RDA will stop at nothing to get the valued energy resource, for “shareholders need results this quarter”.

Sound familiar? It is a story of human history, a reminder of the largest slaughter in human history, the European colonization of the Americas and other parts of earth. Corporations, complicit with government support, are doing the same thing today in places like Nigeria, India, and even to the Lubicon in Alberta. Avatar allows you to get a glimpse of how brutal this colonization was (and is). If humans really did find life on other planets we would continue the same pattern of removing and killing species for resources. It made me really hope that humans do not ever find life on other planets.

To top it off, the main character is wheel chair bound, having lost movement in his legs. There is technology that would allow him to walk, but he can’t afford it so he joins the corporation to engage in war against the Na’vi (this was clearly a jab at the US health care and military system). Avatar showed the ruthlessness of corporations and how humans justify working for these entities that have an insatiable greed.

Avatar explores the issues of colonization, the environment, health care and warns us of corporate power and greed. With breath taking special effects to boot, this movie was everything I could ask for. Director James Cameron should be commended for tackling these issues in such an entertaining and spectacular way.

The question is, can activists take advantage of the Avatar phenomenon (it will likely be the highest grossing movie of all time) or will audiences be just dazzled by the special effects and leave the theatre to continue to support and work for such corporations? I think we can use Avatar as inspiration to create a world where humans have profound respect for all life and respect each other as equals, a world free of corporations, and a world that provides high quality health care for everyone. If we can dream it, we can create it.