...or Why I Hate "Avatar": A Contemplation on Externalities
So I am pretty sick of hearing about how great “Avatar” is. On the eve of it possibly winning the Best Picture Oscar, I feel like sharing my opinion. While my reasoning is not totally rooted in economic reasons, it seemed like a decent enough topic for the blog assignment, and it is somewhat difficult for me to get my entire point out on why I hated it before I am harangued by the legion of apologists. And I know what you are thinking. “It was about the special effects, and that the story didn’t have to be that good. It wasn’t about the acting, it was about the world he created.” Fine. Great. Wonderful. My gripe is not with the story. I love some movies with downright terrible or incoherent plots. My problem is with the message.
By the conservative estimates, “Avatar” cost $237 million dollars to make. Two-hundred. And thirty-seven. MILLION. Freaking. Dollars. In the midst of a global recession, we have $237 millie just hanging out to blow on what some had called the largest gamble in cinematic history. Add to that the $150 million allocated for promotional costs, and you have yourself a total bill of $387 million. And this is the conservative estimate. Some people place the total costs at over half a billion dollars. This does NOT include the cost of developing the software and cameras used to create the film, which could easily add several million dollars to that figure. Then you factor in Mr. Cameron’s opportunity cost for spending 15 years of his life making this movie. Sure it is the highest-grossing movie of all time, but will he see a dime of it? Likely not, according to this article. Accounting profit? Yes. Economic profit? Who knows.
“So it cost an buttload of money, Marcus. Who cares? Hollywood spends ridiculous amounts of money all the time on atrocious films. Why pick on ‘Avatar’?” I’ll tell you why. I have a serious problem with some d-bag spending over half a billion dollars to make a movie that costs me $15-20 dollars to wear plastic glasses so I can watch 3 hours of painful dialogue comprised of big blue avatars (watch your metaphors, buddy) telling me to save the freaking planet. “Energy is only borrowed; you have to give it back?!?” What about the gas used to drive to and from the studio every day, or the electricity burned in the fifteen years it took to make the movie? How many Styrofoam cups were thrown away by programmers building the software, and how much disposable plastic was used/thrown away during that whole time? This doesn’t even begin to factor in the gas used and waste generated by the theater-going masses. Anyone who knows me knows I am not a tree-hugging hippie, but I find this glaring hypocrisy downright appalling. You want to save the world? Dedicate fifteen years of your life and half a billion dollars SAVING THE WORLD. Don’t expend all of those resources and expect me to do it while you fly around in a jet with your self-righteous, “I’m doing good for the planet” feeling. I pulled the following quote from the Word Wildlife Fund website, dated 17 December 2009:
“In addition, Australia, France, Japan, Norway, the United Kingdom and the United States announced they will commit USD $3.5 billion of public finance over three years to reduce emissions from deforestation and degradation (REDD) in developing countries.”
At the time I am writing this “Avatar” has made around 2.6 billion dollars worldwide, and is the highest-grossing movie of all time. It will likely make much more before all is said and done. I love movies. I love ridiculous, big-budget action movies. I do NOT love being preached to, especially in such a ham-fisted, contradictory manner so economically disadvantageous to your purported goal.
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Well stated. I agree that with all that money being thrown around, lots of it could have gone to the greater good. Sure, movies are expensive but when you add up the cost of everything else, the money could have been better placed to help boost our economic situation. Nice post.
ReplyDeleteIf I may, I'd like to add an economic effect that a lot of people have ignored in regards to this film. Maybe it is not so much as an effect as much as a surprising implication.
ReplyDeleteOne of the main expectations of the 'information age' brought on by the rise of the internet is that culture would, in fact, begin to localize. The more information people have access to the more likely they are to shift to more immediate sources. Instead of watching the guy from Oregon break his skateboard and then himself on a rail on youtube I would watch the guy in Anchorage do it. But this is seeming to become one of those many relics of social theorizing that people look back on and think, "Oh how quaint."
What I see in this explosive success in Avatar is the incredible ubiquity of a single experience. I see the growth of globally homogenized culture. It strikes me as very odd that as technology is getting cheaper to access, films easier to make etc. we still see this massive growth in the major production companies. Instead of wanting a unique experience everyone seems to want to be able to say, "I saw Avatar just like everyone else!" It seems strange to me that two years in a row we saw major productions shattering records (The Dark Knight and Avatar) and fewer of us seem to be able to name local filmmakers. Heck, some of us may not even be aware that there are local filmmakers at this point.
Now before you accuse me of decrying the big producers and the economic, maybe even cultural, growth we see with phenomena like Avatar understand that I'm just observing it. Yes, I try not to join in 'me-too' culture too much but I'm not being so critical as I am amazed. Not having the drive to participate (I see fewer and fewer major film productions every year) makes it harder for me to understand what's happening.
Seeing a phenomena like this and observing its cultural impact makes me wonder about the forces that drive the choices to participate. People are now willing to pay $15 for a single viewing of a film; what seems so obviously pulp fiction is put up for 'best film'; theaters around the world spend ridiculous amounts 'upgrading' to XD-3D; heavy handed contradictory moral-ism that you explicated in your post; and local sources of culture seem to get ignored. How much of this is growth as opposed to irrational cultural exuberance? I'm interested in the next film that costs this much, because maybe, just maybe, we'll see an even more interesting phenomena: a $500 million dollar flop.
Hehe, very true. I notice the same trend with politicians and news. Everyone can name the president, and most people can name governors, senators, and representatives from other more populated, newsworthy states. Very few people are able to name their city councilperson or district representative...
ReplyDeleteI really like how you put that movie into a different perspective. Untill reading your post, I would not have thought that making this particular movie would have such bad aspects. I totally agree with you that Hollywood spends so much money on basically useless things. Not to mention the way over paid actors and actresses. There are Definitely way more important things to be spending money on than something that is just simply entertaining and nothing else. Like helping third world countries maybe. It is sort of contradictory huh? "Saving the world." But doing so at such an unnecessary amount!
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