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Author Topic: The Avatar effect: Movie-goers feel depressed and even suicidal at not being able to
tina m
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stupid people...

We can all identify with the escapism a trip to the movies offers from our daily lives - particularly during the bleak weather.
But fans of James Cameron's 3D sci-fi epic Avatar are seemingly finding it harder than usual to separate fact from fiction.
Internet forums have been flooded with posts by movie-goers plagued with depression and even suicidal thoughts about not being able to visit the film's utopian alien world Pandora.
Lifelike: Avatar is watched in 3D and appears extremely lifelike with a range of stunning visual effects
According to CNN, North American fan site 'Avatar Forums' has received 1,000 posts under a thread entitled 'Ways to cope with the depression of the dream of Pandora being intangible'.
Forum administrator Philippe Baghdassarian said: 'I wasn't depressed myself. In fact the movie made me happy.

'But I can understand why it made people depressed. The movie was so beautiful and it showed something we don't have here on Earth. I think people saw we could be living in a completely different world and that caused them to be depressed.'
The blockbuster movie - which has already taken more than $1billion at the box office - tells the story of a disabled marine sent on a mission to a planet called Pandora, home to a race of giant blue aliens.
Humans are intent on exploiting the planet for its resources but clash with the native Na'vi, who inhabit their world in perfect harmony with nature.

This fantasy world, with its weird and wonderful plant and animal life, is brought to life using stunning special effects.

More...Pocket-sized projector that screens your photos on to any surface, wins techie 'Oscar' (but no prizes for the world's first sexbot)

Forum user 'okoi' writes: 'After I watched Avatar at the first time, I truly felt depressed as I "wake" up in this world again.
'So after a few days, I went to cinema and watched it again for the second time to relieve the depression and hopeless feeling. Now I listen to the soundtrack and share my views in this forum. It really helps.'

User Mike wrote on another fan site 'Naviblue' that he considered suicide after watching the film.
Mike wrote: 'Ever since I went to see "Avatar" I have been depressed. Watching the wonderful world of Pandora and all the Na'vi made me want to be one of them. I can't stop thinking about all the things that happened in the film and all of the tears and shivers I got from it.
'I even contemplate suicide thinking that if I do it I will be rebirthed in a world similar
to Pandora.'
The incredible visual realism of the film could mean viewers become particularly attached.
Dr. Stephan Quentzel, psychiatrist and Medical Director for the Louis Armstrong Centre for Music and Medicine at Beth Israel Medical Centre in New York told CNN: 'Virtual life is not real life and it never will be, but this is the pinnacle of what we can build in a virtual presentation so far.

'It has taken the best of our technology to create this virtual world and real life will never be as utopian as it seems onscreen. It makes real life seem more imperfect.'


Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1242409/The-Avatar-effect-Movie-goers-feel-depressed-suicidal-able-visit-utopian-alien-planet.html#ixzz0cMOw82Sj

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Brada-Anansi
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Tina some folks are just lonely,and need to do more in their personal lives,yes the movie makes you think about real world politics the environment and the direction we humans seems to be heading that's what decent movies is suppose to do make one think,but not suicidal.
Posts: 6546 | From: japan | Registered: Feb 2009  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
AGÜEYBANÁ II (Mind718)
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Aside from the hidden political messages Avatar is supposed to possess. I was just reading the following about Avatar elsewhere, and had to note the coincidence...



http://movies.yahoo.com/news/movies.ap.org/some-see-racist-theme-alien-adventure-avatar-ap

Some see racist theme in alien adventure 'Avatar' (AP)


Near the end of the hit film "Avatar," the villain snarls at the hero, "How does it feel to betray your own race?" Both men are white — although the hero is inhabiting a blue-skinned, 9-foot-tall, long-tailed alien.

Strange as it may seem for a film that pits greedy, immoral humans against noble denizens of a faraway moon, "Avatar" is being criticized by a small but vocal group of people who allege it contains racist themes — the white hero once again saving the primitive natives.

Since the film opened to widespread critical acclaim three weeks ago, hundreds of blog posts, newspaper articles, tweets and YouTube videos have said things such as the film is "a fantasy about race told from the point of view of white people" and that it reinforces "the white Messiah fable."

The film's writer and director, James Cameron, says the real theme is about respecting others' differences.

In the film (read no further if you don't want the plot spoiled for you) a white, paralyzed Marine, Jake Sully, is mentally linked to an alien's body and set loose on the planet Pandora. His mission: persuade the mystic, nature-loving Na'vi to make way for humans to mine their land for unobtanium, worth $20 million per kilo back home.

Like Kevin Costner in "Dances with Wolves" and Tom Cruise in "The Last Samurai" or as far back as Jimmy Stewart in the 1950 Western "Broken Arrow," Sully soon switches sides. He falls in love with the Na'vi princess and leads the bird-riding, bow-and-arrow-shooting aliens to victory over the white men's spaceships and mega-robots.

Adding to the racial dynamic is that the main Na'vi characters are played by actors of color, led by a Dominican, Zoe Saldana, as the princess. The film also is an obvious metaphor for how European settlers in America wiped out the Indians.

Robinne Lee, an actress in such recent films as "Seven Pounds" and "Hotel for Dogs," said that "Avatar" was "beautiful" and that she understood the economic logic of casting a white lead if most of the audience is white.

But she said the film, which so far has the second-highest worldwide box-office gross ever, still reminded her of Hollywood's "Pocahontas" story — "the Indian woman leads the white man into the wilderness, and he learns the way of the people and becomes the savior."

"It's really upsetting in many ways," said Lee, who is black with Jamaican and Chinese ancestry. "It would be nice if we could save ourselves."

Annalee Newitz, editor-in-chief of the sci-fi Web site io9.com , likened "Avatar" to the recent film "District 9," in which a white man accidentally becomes an alien and then helps save them, and 1984's "Dune," in which a white man becomes an alien Messiah.

"Main white characters realize that they are complicit in a system which is destroying aliens, AKA people of color ... (then) go beyond assimilation and become leaders of the people they once oppressed," she wrote.

"When will whites stop making these movies and start thinking about race in a new way?" wrote Newitz, who is white.

Black film professor and author Donald Bogle said he can understand why people would be troubled by "Avatar," although he praised it as a "stunning" work.

"A segment of the audience is carrying in the back of its head some sense of movie history," said Bogle, author of "Toms, Coons, Mulattoes, Mammies & Bucks: An Interpretive History of Blacks in American Films."

Bogle stopped short, however, of calling the movie racist.

"It's a film with still a certain kind of distortion," he said. "It's a movie that hasn't yet freed itself of old Hollywood traditions, old formulas."

Writer/director Cameron, who is white, said in an e-mail to The Associated Press that his film "asks us to open our eyes and truly see others, respecting them even though they are different, in the hope that we may find a way to prevent conflict and live more harmoniously on this world. I hardly think that is a racist message."

There are many ways to interpret the art that is "Avatar."

What does it mean that in the final, sequel-begging scene, Sully abandons his human body and transforms into one of the Na'vi for good? Is Saldana's Na'vi character the real heroine because she, not Sully, kills the arch-villain? Does it matter that many conservatives are riled by what they call liberal environmental and anti-military messages?

Is Cameron actually exposing the historical evils of white colonizers? Does the existence of an alien species expose the reality that all humans are actually one race?

"Can't people just enjoy movies any more?" a person named Michelle posted on the Web site for Essence, the magazine for black women, which had 371 comments on a story debating the issue.

Although the "Avatar" debate springs from Hollywood's historical difficulties with race, Will Smith recently saved the planet in "I Am Legend," and Denzel Washington appears ready to do the same in the forthcoming "Book of Eli."

Bogle, the film historian, said that he was glad Cameron made the film and that it made people think about race.

"Maybe there is something he does want to say and put across" about race, Bogle said. "Maybe if he had a black hero in there, that point would have been even stronger."

Posts: 6572 | From: N.Y.C....Capital of the World | Registered: Jun 2008  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Brada-Anansi
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Agreed somewhat with the critique above,but having a blackman or another person of color in the roll as Sully.. would have been too obvious as they or their ancestors were the ones who under-went similiar exploitation back on earth,think of the Black and or Muslem soldiers who turned their guns on their colleagues,it would send a distinct message those people cannot be trusted in the armed forces.plus the movie maker made it easy by having a mercenary army rather than a national one.
Posts: 6546 | From: japan | Registered: Feb 2009  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
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Why people always have to see racism in everything????

The same conversation took place during the *2012* thread.

Why don't you simply just see the movie as ART cause that's what it is and basta..... enjoy it.

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Brada-Anansi
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Hi Tigerlily!! well in this case the movie's director/producer went into the issue and I totally enjoyed it,but this movie had a lot of sub text,environmental,racial,the war in Iraq..remember this movie was conceived in the Bush era.
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It's just a movie....a tad violent I'd say. I certainly wouldn't want to live among the huge man eating birds and dinosaur type things, people are strange, must be on drugs. I don't people rave over films based on real life "Blindside" a new release movie same time frame for instance, the woman helped a poor down and out black kid in a rich white neighborhood.
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tina m
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i gues since i never feel like killing myself nor do i deal with racism on a daily basis i have no clue how they feel. yes we all have fantasies ofcourse. but to wanna kill yrself is plainly stupid.

--------------------
your ass is so tight when you fart only a dog can hear it.when you queef only a cat can hear that one.

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-Just Call Me Jari-
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quote:
Originally posted by MindoverMatter718:
Aside from the hidden political messages Avatar is supposed to possess. I was just reading the following about Avatar elsewhere, and had to note the coincidence...



http://movies.yahoo.com/news/movies.ap.org/some-see-racist-theme-alien-adventure-avatar-ap

Some see racist theme in alien adventure 'Avatar' (AP)


Near the end of the hit film "Avatar," the villain snarls at the hero, "How does it feel to betray your own race?" Both men are white — although the hero is inhabiting a blue-skinned, 9-foot-tall, long-tailed alien.

Strange as it may seem for a film that pits greedy, immoral humans against noble denizens of a faraway moon, "Avatar" is being criticized by a small but vocal group of people who allege it contains racist themes — the white hero once again saving the primitive natives.

Since the film opened to widespread critical acclaim three weeks ago, hundreds of blog posts, newspaper articles, tweets and YouTube videos have said things such as the film is "a fantasy about race told from the point of view of white people" and that it reinforces "the white Messiah fable."

The film's writer and director, James Cameron, says the real theme is about respecting others' differences.

In the film (read no further if you don't want the plot spoiled for you) a white, paralyzed Marine, Jake Sully, is mentally linked to an alien's body and set loose on the planet Pandora. His mission: persuade the mystic, nature-loving Na'vi to make way for humans to mine their land for unobtanium, worth $20 million per kilo back home.

Like Kevin Costner in "Dances with Wolves" and Tom Cruise in "The Last Samurai" or as far back as Jimmy Stewart in the 1950 Western "Broken Arrow," Sully soon switches sides. He falls in love with the Na'vi princess and leads the bird-riding, bow-and-arrow-shooting aliens to victory over the white men's spaceships and mega-robots.

Adding to the racial dynamic is that the main Na'vi characters are played by actors of color, led by a Dominican, Zoe Saldana, as the princess. The film also is an obvious metaphor for how European settlers in America wiped out the Indians.

Robinne Lee, an actress in such recent films as "Seven Pounds" and "Hotel for Dogs," said that "Avatar" was "beautiful" and that she understood the economic logic of casting a white lead if most of the audience is white.

But she said the film, which so far has the second-highest worldwide box-office gross ever, still reminded her of Hollywood's "Pocahontas" story — "the Indian woman leads the white man into the wilderness, and he learns the way of the people and becomes the savior."

"It's really upsetting in many ways," said Lee, who is black with Jamaican and Chinese ancestry. "It would be nice if we could save ourselves."

Annalee Newitz, editor-in-chief of the sci-fi Web site io9.com , likened "Avatar" to the recent film "District 9," in which a white man accidentally becomes an alien and then helps save them, and 1984's "Dune," in which a white man becomes an alien Messiah.

"Main white characters realize that they are complicit in a system which is destroying aliens, AKA people of color ... (then) go beyond assimilation and become leaders of the people they once oppressed," she wrote.

"When will whites stop making these movies and start thinking about race in a new way?" wrote Newitz, who is white.

Black film professor and author Donald Bogle said he can understand why people would be troubled by "Avatar," although he praised it as a "stunning" work.

"A segment of the audience is carrying in the back of its head some sense of movie history," said Bogle, author of "Toms, Coons, Mulattoes, Mammies & Bucks: An Interpretive History of Blacks in American Films."

Bogle stopped short, however, of calling the movie racist.

"It's a film with still a certain kind of distortion," he said. "It's a movie that hasn't yet freed itself of old Hollywood traditions, old formulas."

Writer/director Cameron, who is white, said in an e-mail to The Associated Press that his film "asks us to open our eyes and truly see others, respecting them even though they are different, in the hope that we may find a way to prevent conflict and live more harmoniously on this world. I hardly think that is a racist message."

There are many ways to interpret the art that is "Avatar."

What does it mean that in the final, sequel-begging scene, Sully abandons his human body and transforms into one of the Na'vi for good? Is Saldana's Na'vi character the real heroine because she, not Sully, kills the arch-villain? Does it matter that many conservatives are riled by what they call liberal environmental and anti-military messages?

Is Cameron actually exposing the historical evils of white colonizers? Does the existence of an alien species expose the reality that all humans are actually one race?

"Can't people just enjoy movies any more?" a person named Michelle posted on the Web site for Essence, the magazine for black women, which had 371 comments on a story debating the issue.

Although the "Avatar" debate springs from Hollywood's historical difficulties with race, Will Smith recently saved the planet in "I Am Legend," and Denzel Washington appears ready to do the same in the forthcoming "Book of Eli."

Bogle, the film historian, said that he was glad Cameron made the film and that it made people think about race.

"Maybe there is something he does want to say and put across" about race, Bogle said. "Maybe if he had a black hero in there, that point would have been even stronger."

You act like this is something new, This is nothing but a rehashing of old, hollywood tales with a new spin. So many movies have done this. Avartar look stupid to me.
Posts: 8804 | From: The fear of his majesty had entered their hearts, they were powerless | Registered: Nov 2007  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Grumman
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I haven't seen the movie and have no plans on seeing it as of yet but if I did see it it would be solely on a special effects basis; not really interested in the racism involved in it because... I know.

That said, when Near the end of the hit film "Avatar," the villain snarls at the hero, "How does it feel to betray your own race?" Both men are white — although the hero is inhabiting a blue-skinned, 9-foot-tall, long-tailed alien.

Instead of racism can it be, maybe, the ''good'' white guy actually sees how some members of his own ''race'' can use other people... and decided to put an end to it simply because of his altruistic component. Well it seems he actually is doing that. So the possible ''white savior'' is bogus at this point.

But... on the other hand if he is the only white guy taking offense at his own peoples' antics then maybe it can be viewed as racism on the part of all the other ''bad'' white guys. Seen another way maybe the good white guy is an aberration in this case; why would the aggressor say ''betraying your race.'' Is there another, esoteric, message involved in that?

In order for it not to be racially seen then all cast members would have to be the same color and physicality with no distinctions (I think). Yet if that be the case then who will see it? So, what to do. Depict the good guys as tree-hugging aliens whom are at-one-with-the-planet and the racism is ''effectively'' disguised, that is, from an alien perspective, because after all who really cares about aliens. But what about that someone who comes along and actually thinks about the content of the movie and comes to a conclusion based on what they see from an earthbound perspective.

Having said that, some will view the movie as nothing more than an entertainment to be had over the weekend, and photographers, still and motion, will drool at the multi-million dollar special effects and simply marvel at what big-budget movies can accomplish.

But what about James Cameron. Does he have an ulterior motive in depicting this ''betrayor of the race'' aspect? Is James Cameron a ''betrayor.'' Readers will note his usage of editing in the movie Titanic where the ship is slowly sinking the first class passengers are simply concerned about getting in line for the next available lifeboat whereas the film editing abrupty takes you to the below decks survival struggle of the third and fourth class citizens whom are locked far underneath the ship with no hope of salvation save a miracle. Obviously not racism here but certainly class distintcion.

So, are the small but vocal minority telling the truth about racism (and class distinction) as a viable component in the movie. I believe they are.

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-Just Call Me Jari-
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quote:
Originally posted by Grumman:
I haven't seen the movie and have no plans on seeing it as of yet but if I did see it it would be solely on a special effects basis; not really interested in the racism involved in it because... I know.

That said, when Near the end of the hit film "Avatar," the villain snarls at the hero, "How does it feel to betray your own race?" Both men are white — although the hero is inhabiting a blue-skinned, 9-foot-tall, long-tailed alien.

Instead of racism can it be, maybe, the ''good'' white guy actually sees how some members of his own ''race'' can use other people... and decided to put an end to it simply because of his altruistic component. Well it seems he actually is doing that. So the possible ''white savior'' is bogus at this point.

But... on the other hand if he is the only white guy taking offense at his own peoples' antics then maybe it can be viewed as racism on the part of all the other ''bad'' white guys. Seen another way maybe the good white guy is an aberration in this case; why would the aggressor say ''betraying your race.'' Is there another, esoteric, message involved in that?

In order for it not to be racially seen then all cast members would have to be the same color and physicality with no distinctions (I think). Yet if that be the case then who will see it? So, what to do. Depict the good guys as tree-hugging aliens whom are at-one-with-the-planet and the racism is ''effectively'' disguised, that is, from an alien perspective, because after all who really cares about aliens. But what about that someone who comes along and actually thinks about the content of the movie and comes to a conclusion based on what they see from an earthbound perspective.

Having said that, some will view the movie as nothing more than an entertainment to be had over the weekend, and photographers, still and motion, will drool at the multi-million dollar special effects and simply marvel at what big-budget movies can accomplish.

But what about James Cameron. Does he have an ulterior motive in depicting this ''betrayor of the race'' aspect? Is James Cameron a ''betrayor.'' Readers will note his usage of editing in the movie Titanic where the ship is slowly sinking the first class passengers are simply concerned about getting in line for the next available lifeboat whereas the film editing abrupty takes you to the below decks survival struggle of the third and fourth class citizens whom are locked far underneath the ship with no hope of salvation save a miracle. Obviously not racism here but certainly class distintcion.

So, are the small but vocal minority telling the truth about racism (and class distinction) as a viable component in the movie. I believe they are.

I would not call it racisism so to speak but European(White) Glorification/Romanitcs. I mean there is really nothing "Wrong" with it other than in many cases such as Poccahantas the truth is distorted to make the White male Hero a savior, lover, and warrior. Its been repeated in many films time and time again...Don't know why people are attacking Avatar for going with the flow. I mean I think the movie is childish and stupid not racist..and I have no plans to see it based on those grounds.
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tina m
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well i have seen it and it has great effects.i usraly aint into them kinda movies but it was good. but hell not good enough to kill yrself over.

--------------------
your ass is so tight when you fart only a dog can hear it.when you queef only a cat can hear that one.

Posts: 9776 | From: You like If only mosquitoes sucked fat instead of blood. | Registered: Jul 2007  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
   

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