Avatar triumph. Part One

With the light hand of James Cameron, who released the world on December 18, 2009 the long -expected film “Avatar”, avataria swept the earth. Fans of the screen pandora paint their faces in blue, welcome each other with the words "I see you!" And they call babies na'vi names . In honor of Avatar, mountains are renamed . Exalted spectators, after removing the stereoles and returning to everyday reality, fall into the depressive-suicidal mood (the so-called “Avatar Effect”) and run to the ticket offices for the ticket for the next session.

It took Avatar a little more than a month to beat the cash desk from the world rental, belonging to the Titanic ($ 1.8 billion, 1997), the previous film of the same director. The first awards were not long in coming - the “Golden Globe” of the Hollywood Association of Foreign Press in the Nominations Film of the Year and directing. The Avatar was nominated to the Oscar to 9 nominations, although, judging by the competitions for the prizes of guilds of producers and film actors, the situation here is not so cloudless.

The choir of votes claims that the Avatar revolutioned in the art of cinema, that this is the “ first film of the 21st century ”. Some put this film on a par with the "Star Wars" film epic, George Lucas, others compare with the onset of the era of color cinema. However, one does not exclude the other.

What really happened? What, in fact, the event?

I

Of course, the film in terms of the plot and the video is built so that it was able to “hook” the widest spectrum of various spectator groups. The film is so dense and frankly saturated with different symbols, archetypes, mythologems, reminiscences and allusions that not only the young generation (for which the scene of sex was excluded from the version for a wide rental) and the woman , but also a number of other target audiences were able to “see” in him “its own”.

The famous fighter for the preservation of nature, President of Bolivia Evo Moles, called the film “an excellent example of confrontation and struggle for the protection of nature,” the Vatican accused the author of the film of excessive enthusiasm of technology and, at the same time, of the apology of pantheism. James Cameron himself in an interview willingly confirms and complements many all kinds of “sources” and parallels: online games, dreams , problems of ecology , war in Iraq, colonization of North and South America, terrorist action on September 11, 2001 and so on .

For all that, not only critics, but also many Avatar supporters note that in neither in terms of the content of the film, in terms of form (images) there is practically no element that would not have its own fairly popular, relatively easily identified primary, prototype, prototype. Almost everything in the Avatar can be said: yes it has already been! Moreover, it was not only in the literature (which, subject to certain etiquette, as they say, “not punishable”), but also in the same cinema, or in the theater, or in animation, or, at worst, in the world of computer games. However, this fact, it seems, does not bother the author or fans of the Avatar at all. The main thing, the latter say, not of anything and what , but as shown. The main thing is the impression made by the film, the shock experienced by the viewer during the session, the effect !

Indeed, we must pay tribute to the director’s skill - whatever the “author’s priority” or not too high fantasy flight, it is almost very difficult not to fall under the charm of the beauty of the Pandora world and the beautiful Love Story unfolding against her background. Aesthetics precedes logic (pre -reason for reason), and therefore easily bypasses all critical filters (unless they were activated and configured against the picture in advance, even before entering the hall). Therefore, the Avatar triumph is, of course, primarily a triumph of aesthetics , in the sense of a total impact on the aesthetic sense of the moviegoer.

The innovative 3D technology here is certainly important, but still, it seems that it itself does not solve the case. If, instead of Avatar, the audience in the same format watched, for example, fantastically beautiful views of the underwater world of coral reefs, would he have such an impact? .. Or if the scenes in the Pandai jungle would be only the dreams of a disabled marine, Jake Sally, would an “avatar” had such a grandiose success? ..

No, the plot is also important in this case. Moreover, apparently, the plot, aesthetics and technology are related in a certain way and rely on each other: “Remove” (replace ”the whole structure, if it does not fall, then noticeably glances.

II

The 3D technology used in the Avatar in terms of influence on the viewer is aimed at solving two problems. Firstly, the erasing of the “inside the frame” between the real world and its computer imitation, first of all, between traditional living actors and computerized characters (not without reason, the US film actors Guild, defiantly circumvented the Avatar in the nominations for its prizes). Secondly, giving the screen to the picture maximum credibility due to the creation of a “voluminous image” (stereo effect), that is, in fact, erosion of the border between “worlds on different sides of the screen”, between reality and illusion. Putting the script written by him on the table, James Cameron had been waiting for more than ten years while progress was reached in solving both of these problems, necessary for him according to the plan of the film . Namely, on the one hand, the characters created by the computer will look quite “alive” on the screen, and the issue of scale will be resolved, that is, the opportunity to support hundreds of individual images within the framework; And on the other hand, the quality of the stereo effect when demonstrating the film will become high enough for the viewer to “really see” and “plunge” into the world he showed.

At the same time, the viewer is demonstrated on the screen not one, but two full -fledged life worlds . One life world is the world of earthlings, represented not by so fantastic (even for today) buildings of the base, technology and people (whom the actors play directly, “live”). The other is the magical world of the incredibly beautiful jungle of the planet Pandora and their intelligent inhabitants-the blue color of three-meter people-cats. Of these two worlds, the first is natural, that is, with living actors and a real (or realistic) entourage, and the second is artificial, “digital” (simulated on a computer) and, moreover, a fictitious world. Having spent four years or more than a hundred million dollars, the director was able to create and convince the viewer of the plausibility of the absolutely imaginary, “twice unreal” world , equalizing him in rights with the world “twice real”. That is, through the new technology of production and demonstration of the movie, the faces are erased not only between reality and illusion, but also between natural and artificial .

A kind of sabotage against the distinction of the natural/artificial is also made in the most plot fabric of the film.

It is, the world of Pandora, on the one hand, is shown as the world of primitive nature from some “Jurassic period”, “a million years BC”, etc. Even the culture of Na'Vi is at a primitive level similar to the Amazonic tribes or other tribes not affected by civilization - presumably, in order not to violate this naturalness of the world.

However, on the other hand, the world of Pandora, if you exclude all the scenes in which living actors “meet” with computer characters, and a number of points, as two drops of water resembles a typical virtual reality - exactly in the sense in which it is created on special simulators or in computer games. Jake moves to this world, to the body of his avatar, in a completely typical way to enter the “advanced” virtual reality. Although Cameron warns in his interviews that the “avatar” is not a “matrix” (delighted him) or any other film in which the hero enters the virtual body into the virtual world, here is a “ real, physically tangible world and you are in a biological body ”, however, this world is more similar to the incurred virtual reality than the initially real world. “Connective” pigtails “giving signals” fluttering seeds, the “server” tree of Ave, the “real” Eiwe itself, which measures every “supply of energy” and capable of sending the entire Pandaorian living creatures to the deadly attack on earthlings, etc. We can say that the reception of the Vachovski brothers is simply brought to the limit by Cameron, that is, the technological basis of the “virtual reality” of Pandora is visually present and practically included in the world of this reality, and neither NA'Vi nor any other characters or objects of the pandarian world (at least not shown and not mentioned) other bodies or other ways than “virtual”. The Omatikayya clan can be considered simultaneously as a “network community”, one of the component of the Pandora world reproduction. They even have a ceremony of initiation is a symbolic construction from the bodies of the Pautins clan (hello www!), In which the initiated hero is included as the link.

Thus, the world of Pandora can almost be interpreted with the same success as a primitive, incredibly symbiotic, and as an artificial, implemented on the basis of some fantastic development of virtual reality technologies. He, as it were, is oscillating between these two extremes, the border between which is erased.

III

All this game with erasing the faces and the “change of places” between reality and the illusion, natural and artificial is supplemented or, if you like, becomes the basis for other “erasures” and turning in the plot itself, including the climax of the hero’s moral choice.

The key is the key importance of the faces, that is, the weakening of the tension of contrast and confrontation, in the opposition of its/alien .

Of course, each of their two two worlds shown to us - its own origins, history, its own biological basis, outwardly and in the physiology of life, alien to the other. Earthlings can not even breathe in the atmosphere of Pandora and call the planet “hell”, and Na'vi (and the viewer!) Perceive it more like a paradise (another ambiguity arranged by Cameron).

That is, these two worlds are certainly alien and alien to each other. They are nearby, on the same planet, but do not want to coexist peacefully. People created avatars, it seems, in order to establish the contact of the two worlds. However, the natives, apparently, have long understood the impossibility of this, and scientists who got the avatars seem to be more passionate about their research and preserving the ability to write about Pandora Fat Books (one such is shown in the frame). Na'vi want to preserve the nature of Pandora, as it is, and their homeostatic lifestyle, and the earthly corporation destroys nature, extracting a fabulously expensive mineral Unobtainium , which is necessary for the Earth from the energy crisis (a new version of the divine fire, stolen by Prometheus for people?). The corporation intends to master the richest deposit of unobtanium, located under the native wood-domestic artis, as they say, "only business, nothing personal." Thus, the culture, the system of values ​​and the interests of humanoids from the two worlds are opposite to each other, and hardly to a lesser extent than in cases of “strangers” and “predator ”. Let us recall, by the way, that at the first meeting with Jake, Neatiri intended to kill him, and her fellow tribesmen were very surprised that she did not do this.

However, “strangers” look very anthropomorphic in the Avatar, reminiscent of the Indians, and the plot itself repeats the typical movie stories about good red-skinned and bad white (by the way, for some reason there are no Negroes among earthlings), that the viewer soon begins to perceive Na'vi just as blue-skinned Indians , and he was used to sympathy Single. In the behavior of Na'Vi there is nothing shocking civilized viewer - even to the extent that occurs when interacting with other cultures of our native planet. And only when blue tails are clearly visible on the screen, or when Na'vi is facing the face with earthlings - the understanding that it is the essence of strangers, it can return, but sympathy for them and sympathy remains. Cameron really achieves that the viewer begins to perceive the tailed primitive na'vi as a kind of “ part of ourselves, which strives to become better, wants to respect nature ”, carrying out the inversion of the usual order of things, in which the dark side of human nature is depicted in the non -(before) human image.

Thus, the viewer soon and without moral problems becomes to the side of the aliens in the conflict with earthlings, that is, he makes “treason” almost earlier than Jake Sally and his few friends. The director needs to be (to be) indifferent to his/alien opposition, whether it is justified biologically, historically, culturally or in any other socially significant way, since otherwise Jake will cease to be a hero in his, the audience, the eyes and the entire structure of the film will immediately collapse.

IV

According to the laws of the genre, Jake Sally simply must be a hero, or rather, a superhero . Reincarnation into something inhuman, significantly expanding certain abilities of the character and/or making it more successful - a common thing for the superhero of comics and the corresponding films.

However, there are a number of features.

Given the considerable fraction of infantilism inherent in Jake, the type of superhero is closer to a teenager who becomes a superhero in some unreal-a magical or virtual world, in dreams, at worst . Starting from the moment when he, becoming completely uncontrollable, made a defeat in the laboratory and ran out into the blue body of the avatar, and until the moment when the colonel informed him that his mission was over and he could return to the ground, Jake behaves like a child in which an exciting computer toy fell. " Daddy, well, can I play a rack? .. ". In other words, it is “transformed” not to commit some kind of heroic-that is, selfless -an act, but, on the contrary, because he gets rid of his paralysis and, like a boy, passionate about onion firing, a jump on six-legged “horses”, flights on a dragon, etc. It follows from his own confession that it does not immediately reach him that the adventures in the Pandarian jungle are not a dream, it is a reality.

His relationship with the colonel is also the authorized relationship between the military personnel different in rank (although the jake of retired, and the colonel, seems to be the same), and a kind of family relationship between the teenage son and the father, including the indispensable “ riot against father’s power ”.

We can say that in Jake , the border between an adult and a child seems to be erased. Therefore, probably, the mother-in-mother of Pandora, called Ave, spared him. It seems that even when he rebels against the actions of earthlings, he does not fully believe in the seriousness of this event for himself: in the end, the avatar is only a remotely controlled biorobot. Tighten the thesis, and for a minute forgetting about the disability of Jake Sally, we can say that he simply parasitizes on his brother’s avatar , on the opportunities that the corporation and scientists provided him.

One way or another, but Jake has two bodies, his “circulation” between them leaves the question of his mortality in the body of the avatar, and, consequently, the degree of heroism of his actions. Therefore, the situation unambiguously dangerous for him arises only at the end of the battle, when Colonel Miles Quorich gets the opportunity to threaten both his bodies, or rather, the human body lying in the capsule. And in this scene, along with the tumor, he fights “only” in his life.

Another difference between Jake from other Hollywood superheroes is that he becomes superhero not for people and not among them.

In general, from the very beginning, Jake Sally could be a superhero only for Na'Vi. He could regain the ability to walk, good general physical shape and attractiveness for girls on earth (Colonel Quorich seemed to fulfill his promise about him about “legs”), but Jake could only become (be) for the population of Pandora. For them, even the fact that he is a stranger contributes to his charisma . And for people on the basis, on the contrary, Jake is just an informant, a scout who fools naive natives who accepted him; And at the same time deceiving (betraying) the trust of scientists helping him.

Oddly enough, the only thing that could gain, if not sympathy, then respect at the base is his disability . The guy rose to the corporal, suffered in hostilities, but did not sit in his stroller somewhere on the ground, but flew to the damn dangerous planet, Pandora (one name is worth it!), Where you constantly need to keep a full ammunition, etc., received an important task, etc.

Such a call could lead to another plot, but it would be completely Another film. Moreover, it would be a film in general from another era . From the one in which, for example, the “ Tale of a real person ” (and its analogues in other countries) was popular.

To be continued...