SvennoJ said:
nitekrawler1285 said:
I guess I'm just from a sexist family lol.
I can concur that most wanted to see it for escapism and not politics.
I think that elements of the design of the heroes and their situation were simply far more appealing(and less excluding) in Avatar than any other comparable film with similar plot in the mainstream eye. Making the characters like many indigenous peoples made it easy for people of any culture to instantly identify with the Na'vi and escape. Making them blue as opposed to any normal human skin color means you don't exclude any group at all. So they weren't trying to get riled up over current affairs. They were tricked into empathizing and escaping into it.
Imperialism and it's effects aren't just current affairs. It's the affairs of man since man's time has begun. You really dont get much older than imperialism. Any place that has a theater for people to go see Avatar has likely been touched by an imperialist nation. So chances are more likely it can appeal.
I love Lawrence of Arabia. I've seen it 3x in 70mm at a local theater that plays classics during the summer. I prefer Avatar personally though. Surely you can see how the Na'vi are more appealing than say bugs in Startship Troopers or Ender's game or even the more direct ones like dances with wolves and pocahontas or fern gully. The Na'vi are basically meta people designed to appeal to all of our positive image of whatever your genetic legacy happens to be.
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My wife is more into comedy, but yeah suggesting women just go for George Cloony is not the best comment ;)
For me the generic race mix in Avatar actually lessens immersion for me. It would be more interesting as a unique vastly different alien species. Enemy mine did that part far better without having to resort to appealing looking blue humans. But it's not so much the generic design of the Aliens, it's more the 1 dimensionality of the human side that drags it down. Starship troopers emphasizes that part and takes it to satire which makes the movie. The alien bugs suit that purpose too, you're not supposed to empathize with them. Morals don't depend on how cute the other side looks.
Anyway to get a little back on topic. Storylines in movies definitely have hit diminishing returns. Games don't seem to fare much better. Graphics however still have the power to dress up the same old in new interesting ways.
For me the more realism in games the better. That doesn't mean it has to look like the real world, it means it has to behave realistically. Our brains are hardwired to process vast amounts of information on a concious and subconscious level. Light, sound, movement all add to immersion. Things behaving like you expect them to behave makes a game better imo.
Ofcourse unrealistic games are still fun. But eye candy is always nice to have. Why else spend all that money on making toy story 3 look so much better than toy story 1. Surely that engine was good enough to tell the story.
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I can definitely understand your criticisms of Avatar come from intellectually. I feel similarly in some cases. From a mainstream appeal I don't think those desing choices would be as appealing even if they might gratify me a bit more and add some depth and complexity.
I don't disagree with that statement at all.
Surely the Toy Story 1 engine was good enough. The only reason Toy Story 3 looked much better is the advancements they had made to accomodate their artistic vision for other titles since then. It wasn't a large extra cost incurred cost.
I just think when large amounts are spent it especially needs to by parties whom can make a return on that investment. I tend to view that as those persons making middleware and engines because those features are something that sells middleware solutions and engines. If costs were reinvested as fluidly as you might see for R&D for say Pixar or the more communicative developers I wouldn't see much of an issue if any.
