The scene I choose is near the end where Sully returns to the Na'vi riding the Toruk, showing that he is truly the chosen one. His bonding with the Toruk, which had only been tamed five times previously in Na'vi history is taken as a symbol by the people that Sully is someone to be trusted and someone worthy to lead them into battle against the humans invading Hometree. In the scenes before this one, Sully had been rejected and told that he could never be one of the people, as a consequence of betraying the Na'vi. And this is entirely correct, he is human. He is NOT Na'vi, something that I think causes a lot of problems. The reality is that Sully is the hero of the story and he has all the human qualities that we like and appreciate in our heroes. He is civilized, he struggles against nature (i.e. the realities and limits of his body), he is handsome, funny, strong etc. He is unequivocally a human male. The fact that he is human AND he has the ability to connect with the Na'vi people makes him even better to the point that, not only is he 'the chosen one' of the Na'vi people (even though he is NOT Na'vi) but he has also demonstrated that he can conquer their world through the taming of the Toruk. Additionally, he is masculine and virile enough that the Na'vi princess has fallen in love with him. And it is assumed that this is because of his hybrid status. Because he is human, he has the 'natural' ability to lead people who are not his own into battle, to strike awe and irreverence in their hearts with his taming of the Toruk (even though just scenes before he admitted to betraying them), and he is basically naturally better at being Na'vi than they are even though he is, well, NOT. The superiority of our race shines through once again. It strikes me as odd that a movie lauded for having such a shining message about understanding other cultures and communing with nature, is based upon an underlying rhetoric of human superiority. We CAN understand other cultures and commune with nature, but only when we prove our own superiority first. Even though the humans were wrong in this instance for trying to destory hometree, Sully went to the Na'vi to convince them to stand up against them, instead of doing anything he could to make the humans understand, it ended up being all about how the Na'vi needed to understand. It was assumed that the humans were doing the natural superior thing, and if the Na'vi didn't like it they should just go ahead and stop it for themselves instead of, you know, human beings having any kind of self-reflexive self-reflection about destroying a culture and planet in the name of capitalism.
Sunday, November 13, 2011
Superiority
The scene I choose is near the end where Sully returns to the Na'vi riding the Toruk, showing that he is truly the chosen one. His bonding with the Toruk, which had only been tamed five times previously in Na'vi history is taken as a symbol by the people that Sully is someone to be trusted and someone worthy to lead them into battle against the humans invading Hometree. In the scenes before this one, Sully had been rejected and told that he could never be one of the people, as a consequence of betraying the Na'vi. And this is entirely correct, he is human. He is NOT Na'vi, something that I think causes a lot of problems. The reality is that Sully is the hero of the story and he has all the human qualities that we like and appreciate in our heroes. He is civilized, he struggles against nature (i.e. the realities and limits of his body), he is handsome, funny, strong etc. He is unequivocally a human male. The fact that he is human AND he has the ability to connect with the Na'vi people makes him even better to the point that, not only is he 'the chosen one' of the Na'vi people (even though he is NOT Na'vi) but he has also demonstrated that he can conquer their world through the taming of the Toruk. Additionally, he is masculine and virile enough that the Na'vi princess has fallen in love with him. And it is assumed that this is because of his hybrid status. Because he is human, he has the 'natural' ability to lead people who are not his own into battle, to strike awe and irreverence in their hearts with his taming of the Toruk (even though just scenes before he admitted to betraying them), and he is basically naturally better at being Na'vi than they are even though he is, well, NOT. The superiority of our race shines through once again. It strikes me as odd that a movie lauded for having such a shining message about understanding other cultures and communing with nature, is based upon an underlying rhetoric of human superiority. We CAN understand other cultures and commune with nature, but only when we prove our own superiority first. Even though the humans were wrong in this instance for trying to destory hometree, Sully went to the Na'vi to convince them to stand up against them, instead of doing anything he could to make the humans understand, it ended up being all about how the Na'vi needed to understand. It was assumed that the humans were doing the natural superior thing, and if the Na'vi didn't like it they should just go ahead and stop it for themselves instead of, you know, human beings having any kind of self-reflexive self-reflection about destroying a culture and planet in the name of capitalism.
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