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 "QUANTUM SHOT" #604
Link
- by Avi Abrams
Going beyond the obvious comparisons with "Ferngully" and "Dances with
Wolves"
By now many of you have seen James Cameron's epic "Avatar" and marveled at
its breakthrough 3D immersion technology. Visually, the movie is beyond
breathtaking. Perhaps it can even be compared to the advent of widescreen
in movie history.
Plot-wise, however, it is a simple, old-fashioned and perhaps overly
familiar adventure, bringing to mind a range of stories from "Pocahontas"
to Miyazaki's "Nausicaa" and "Princess Mononoke". Some see this as a
drawback, others praise the straightforward approach to story-telling and
dialogue - after all, it's one less thing to distract you from the awesome
spectacle that unfolds on the screen.
"Yes, it is predictable in a way that roller coaster ride is
predictable", says one reviewer. Likewise, it's even possible that the main character
was intentionally made somewhat bland and toned down in personality, so
that any viewer could identify with the main hero - seamlessly inhabiting
his "avatar" to explore the glorious new world of Pandora.
It is not our intention to argue how and if the plot of "Avatar" could've
been made better or more original. After all, it is an old-fashioned
fairytale; a personal dream of maestro James Cameron many decades in the
making.
Instead, we are going to list some
possible influences from obscure and even forgotten classic science
fiction sources
that came to our mind while watching "Avatar" - there is no telling if
James Cameron read any of them or was influenced by any particular
tradition, but it was a good fun to find out and remember the jolly good
reads that they are (see if you can remember any of the stories mentioned
below, or if you can think of other ones):
1. Robert F. Young - "To Fell a Tree". First published in
Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, July 1959, this obscure and
rarely reprinted novella is perhaps the closest to the plot of "Avatar".
A giant tree sacred to humanoid natives razed to the ground by the greedy,
crazed human military outfit - the parallels are too many to recount here.
Robert F. Young's prose is powerful and efficient, and the ending evokes
similar emotional response to that of "Avatar". It is also a criminally
under-rated piece of fiction - we can only rejoice that "Avatar" brings it
to life to beautifully - but it's also sad to see top-notch science
fiction stories by Robert F. Young remain out of print and uncredited for
so many years.
The idea of "projected consciousness" into the bodies of natives on
hostile planets was also explored at length in classic science fiction.
Here are a few examples:
2. Poul Anderson - "Call Me Joe" First published in
Astounding Science Fiction in April, 1957. Read more detailed
analysis
here.
"Like Avatar, Call Me Joe centers on a paraplegic — Ed Anglesey — who
telepathically connects with an artificially created life form in order to
explore a harsh planet (in this case, Jupiter). Anglesey, like "Avatar"'s
Jake Sully, revels in the freedom and strength of his artificially created
body, battles predators on the surface of Jupiter, and gradually goes
native as he spends more time connected to his artificial body."
3. Ben Bova - "The Winds of Altair" First published as a novel in
1973. Six-legged beasties, remote-control "avatars", greedy terraforming
humans. "The classic SciFi novel tells the story of humans trying to
terraform the planet of Altair IV, where they cannot breath the air. The
natives of this planet are a cat-like race and humans are able to transfer
their minds into these cats in order to explore the planet safely.
Throughout the course of the novel, the main character inhabits the body
of one of these cats (just like in Avatar) and grows to side with the
natives against the Military in the story." (source)
4. Clifford Simak - "Desertion" First published in November 1944
issue of Astounding Science Fiction. Same idea: human research team
on the surface of a hostile planet needs to inhabit "avatar" bodies more
suitable to environment. One small problem - those who were sent did not
come back, but "deserted" and remained behind, choosing a more liberating
alien culture.
Another work very similar in plot and feel is actually an award-winning
piece by a well-known writer:
5. Ursula K. Le Guin - "The Word for World is Forest" (more
info). Published back in 1972, in Again, Dangerous Visions, it was
even a winner of the 1973 Hugo Award for Best Novella.
Similarities? Well, how about a forested planet with the deeply
"connected" natives, a human military raid on a huge tree-city and a
subsequent retaliation of natives... some scenes seem incredibly familiar,
even though Le Guin plot is markedly deeper and more sophisticated. We
highly recommend seeking out this book if you thought the plot of "Avatar"
was one-dimensional - it should fill in all the details you would ever
need.
Other visual and atmospheric clues (no similarities with the plot):
6. Harry Harrison - "Deathworld" First published in
Astounding Science Fiction, January-March 1960. A militaristic
gung-ho colonization with disregard for complexities of native life.
Top-notch depiction of tough space marines as only Harrison can do it.
Extremely hostile life-forms populate that planet: Avatar's quote
"everything that crawls, flies or squats out there... will want to kill
you" seems right at home with "Deathworld". Highly recommended as a great
adventure read.
7. Some other wonderful examples from the Golden Age of Science Fiction
also come to mind: "Exploration Team" by Murray Leinster; hilarious
interactions between human military colonization force and natives in
various stories by Eric Frank Russell ("...And Then There Were
None", "Somewhere a Voice", etc.) Various jungle planet environments were
nicely explored by Robert A. Heinlein in his juvenile-fiction novels, and
also in Bob Shaw's "Who Goes There?".
(on the right - Magazine of F&SF with Robert F. Young's novella
"To Fell a Tree")
8. Anne McCaffrey - "The Dragonriders of Pern" series. This is an
obvious allusion to exhilarating sequences of taming and riding on dragons
- very analogous to the thrilling winged-beast taming in "Avatar".
9. Na'vi - Dark Elves, anyone? Or if you'd like, "Elfquest" (more
info).
A cult comic series started in 1978. There are very broad visual
similarities, but I can't stop thinking of dark elves when I look at na'vi
ways and romance.
10. The interior and exterior views of the spaceship which brings Jake
Sully to Pandora reminds me of
Alastair Reynolds "Revelation Space" light-hugger ships
(significantly scaled down, of course). The opening sequence can easily
serve as an opening for hypothetical "Chasm City" movie, for example. The
flying mountains and islands are also a feature of Alastair Reynolds great
story "Minla's Flowers".
So here is a brief list of possible influences on visual creation of
"Avatar" and examples of classic science fiction that elaborate on the
(very basic) "Avatar" plot. Let us know of other similarities you've
noticed - after all, just like the case with "Star Wars" we are witnessing
the birth of yet another mythology, and it is only proper that we should
honor the original sources of this particular science fiction tradition.
For more details on Pandora's gorgeous world visit
Pandorapedia
site.
BONUS: do you remember the wonderful tiny helicopter-like creature
that lit up the night on Pandora? It turns out to be the design of
Leonardo da Vinci, no less:
CONTINUE TO OUR SCIENCE FICTION SITE ->
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62 Comments:
Piers Anthony's "Viscous Circle" (1982) features our hero transplanting his mind into a native's body, with the plan being to help despoil their planet, but eventually he goes native and helps them resist the humans.
Is this a movie that an adult would want to go see?
Midworld by Alan Dean Foster
"Hunter, Come Home" by Richard McKenna. Giant alien trees connected by a network.
Though I agree with Sleestak that Midworld's home trees are a very close match.
Deathworld is available as a free e-book from:
http://manybooks.net
Apparently the copyright was not renewed.
I went and saw Avatar last night: a gorgeous visual feast and I was
impressed by how seamlessly the 3D elements cohered into the
narrative: technology that instantly becomes intuitive is usually technology that will augment one's experience immeasurably (think of
how intuitive the internet is, and how quickly we've come to
assimilate it into our daily experience!).
I think a polarised film over a television screen will be the next
step - we'll lose the hokey glasses because the screen 'wears' it forus.
As a writer, Cameron is an excellent director. 'Come to papa'. REALLY, James? Very chiched and banal dialogue. I nearly burst out laughing a few times. I support the simple plot as outlined in the post, but the dialogue borders on the ridiculous.
And army robots with combat knives?! Where's a corncob pipe for when the day's pillaging is done?
Just my 2c.
Anyhoo, cheery Christmas!
H. Beam Piper's "Little Fuzzy" was brought to mind. Does a native alien race have the right to control the resources of its own planet over the machinations of a greedy human corporation? ("Little Fuzzy" is available at Project Gutenberg)
Visually, one can see similarities between fauna, flora and terra (Pandorae?)in Yes album covers, specifically those by Roger Dean.
You've got something here! Well searched huh? Really love to read your thoughts.
Thanks for this wonderful insights.
Anne McCaffrey also wrote the Powers That Be series, about a damaged ex-soldier sent to a self-aware planet with an intricately inter-linked ecosystem, to get friendly with the residents as the military's woman-on-the-inside: she ends up going native, defending the planet from the industrial-military complex, and being healed.
A withdrawn forest people from whom humans want something and are prepared to take it by force, then begin transformations from humans into forest people, sacred trees, sacred shamans, exotic relationships between people and animals, clash of modern vs medieval weapons and intelligent exotic animals. Finally, a populations in tune with all nature and the trees sheltering and servicing as the source and the network of that knowledge. Andre Norton: Judgement on Janus.
The Themes and archetypes used in Avatar permeate literature and transcend culture and have been told countless times eg Eden lost through knowledge(technology), enlightenment through nature as apposed to the establishment, the clash of mans instincts with cold modern reality(disillusionment) and the story of the man how never dreams but at the same time dreams to much. anyone who sees something as being completely original has not done their research, and anyone who faults this movie for it's similarity to dances with wolves or any other of the countless stories, myths, and legends that employ the same premise or characters is short sighted. Any artist will tell you that everyone has an influence. some say it goes a little deeper then that. arising form our shared experiences(as we are all human this hardly seems surprising) we have a sort of collective unconsious ...Hm that sounds familare as well.
Thank you Joseph Campbell
anyone who says it is to simple a plot needs to do more thinking and less talking.
Formerlawyer:
Not only is Deathworld available in print for free since it is in the public domain, but you can get an audiobook version for free from LibriVox.org as well. It's a halfway decent reading too.
OP:
I disagree with the statement that Deathworld has only visual and atmospheric clue and no similarities with the overall plot. In the big picture(tm), it is quite compatible with the plot of Avatar. It is only the time scale of the overall history of Pyrrah that differs with the plot of the movie. The war between the planet and the humans has been going on for 300 years. In the end of Deathworld, the planet's natives do mount a renewed and cooperative full-spectrum counterattack on the human base aided by humans that have "gone native." The overall plot theme is the same in the end.
You also forgot Amy Thomson's Color of Distance about researchers going native.
It's not Alan dean Foster's "Midworld". The people are blue in the movie and not green!
Various works by Andre Norton spring immediately to mind.
This is hardly a suprise: not that I've seen every single one of his movies, but James Cameron is not exactly known for the originality of his plots. The broad outline of Terminator is identical with that of the 1966 Doctor Who serial "The War Machines." Titanic is history with a generic tragic love story thrown in. Et cetera.
Well, since people seem to be aware of Deathworld , let me weigh in and say that to characterize the humans as "space marines" is simply wrong. In fact, the colonists have rather evolved along with the native flora and fauna, adapting to heavier gravity and so forth. They aren't and never have been "space marines."
Manta's Gift by Zahn employs the device of a handicapped man used to get inside the body of a native (stingray-like creatures in Jupiter's atmosphere.) They aren't avatars— his brain is actually grafted into an embryo, with the permission of the natives— but it's got its similarities.
No one mentioned the second and third book of the "Ender's" series? I'm shocked.
Just goes to show how hard it is to come up with a new plotline. They have already be done.
carson:
A being appears in the sky,
a young woman with no sex life,
an angry 'king' sending his soldier to kill innocents, looking for the one who will overthrow 'him',
the being tries to calm the woman, telling her she will bare humanity's savior with the initials 'JC', they go on the run
the good guys win.
I'm not so sure he was ripping off dr who.
i cant believe not a single person mentioned the masterful Dune by Frank Herbert.
There were several scenes in Avatar that seemed like a ripoff of Aliens with Sigourney Weaver. And then later there was some music that seemed identical to music used in Aliens.
I remember the first time I encountered the "telepresence concept", it was as a kid in the 60s with the juvenile sci fi book ROBOTS OF SATURN (great memories). The three young heroes encounter a hut on a moon of Saturn, in this hut are two guys apparently sitting unconscious with electrical contacts on their foreheads. It turns out they were remotely controlling/experiencing large and powerful robot bodies elsewhere on the small moon. Cool stuff!
"La Planete Sauvage" Anyone.....?
Anne McCaffrey, mentioned a couple of times above, also has a section in the early novel "The Ship Who Sang."
The titular ship takes a crew of actors to a planet highly inhospitable to human life. Once there, they project into alien "envelopes" in order to perform Hamlet for the aliens.
Several of the actors become too wrapped up in the sensations provided by the envelopes and "go native."
Dune....it's much closer than the dragon riders of pern
Manta's Gift? the list goes on..
Without naming a particular title, I thought the whole film was redolent of great sci-fi/adventure Franco-Belgian bande dessinée (comic strips) of the past 50 years. Whereas Americans were fascinated by superheroes in long underwear, Enuropeans were following tha dventures of (1) "good savages" like Timour and Rohan ans (2) space explorers like the ones depicted by Moebius (and republished in the US by "Heavy Metal"). The same inspiration informs the recent movie "10,000 BC" - a flop in the US, a great success everywhere else.
Benoit Racine
Toronto
I second, or third, or whatever, the artistic links with Roger Dean's paintings & designs. (band Yes covers but also other stuff) I was surprised not to see him in the credits.
The special breathing organs on the 'dragons' immediately called to mind the 'superchargers' on the Ythrians from Poul Anderson's "Earth Book of Stormgate". I don't recall anything about it being mentioned in the dialog, but some auxiliary breathing system would be important (as Anderson made clear) for flying creatures of that size. Recent work on pterosaurs indicates that our own 'flying dragons' found a different solution to the problem.
http://scienceblogs.com/tetrapodzoology/2009/02/pterosaur_breathing_air_sacs.php
I found it absolutely awesome. Simple enough. I saw many similarities to many books I have read in the past, but it was its own story.
Bravo, James Cameron.
I think Blish's A Case of Conscience might be another one - though I haven't yet seen the film I must confess!
Don't forget Roger Dean artwork on "Yes" album covers for floating rock formations
Nice research article. Still doesn't excuse IP infringement. Wouldn't it be nice if 20th Century Fox posted some allowed fandom guidelines?
In "The Stone God Awakens", a less known novel by Philip José Farmer, the main organism in a future Earth is a huge tree, that developed connections with all the other trees in the world, just like a mainframe computer with dumb terminals. It is a book from 1970.
I enjoyed that Cameron pulled ideas from so many sources (intentional or not) to create "Avatar". Thanks for citing so many. I haven't seen Terry Brook's "Tanequil" mentioned here for its parallel to sentient trees.
I noticed similarities between Avatar and an old HG Wells book I once read, I think it was called "A Dream of Armageddon", where a man was living two lives by being a soldier in the future while he was asleep and "dreaming" in the real world and vice versa. He eventually swapped over as the dreams got more real and exciting and real life became more vague and boring to him, and ended living in the world which was originally just his future dream "avatar". This was a great story, as is avatar. Loved the movie
The guy who mentioend Roger Dean further up is right on--those floating landmasses and arches are right off Yes album covers, and even the dragon-ish things are very similar to some of his work (I'm thinking most specifically about that bland orchestral to Pink Floyd that came out in the mid-to-late-90s).
What is this, TEN different sources? It's the Disney movie Pocahontas with aliens. That's it.
Thanks so much for this brain-jolt. I've been trying to think of "Winds of Altair" since Avatar was first mentioned!
You know the story. The dialogue is clunky ( i loled in the cinema ) and yet I found this film to be almost transcendental. Don't try and think while you watch it. Put your hood up and just be inside it.
You know, it also reminds me of the movie The Mission, only in that movie, it turns our much worse for the natives. I still can't listen to Adagio for Strings without tearing up...
Smurfs too! lol
But seriously it was a fun movie to watch.
"The Emerald Forest", a great movie by John Boorman made in 1985. The white outsider learns the ways of the natives in the beautifully shot Amazonian forest, although this was not really a choice as he was kidnapped as a kid. He learns and become a real man during a ceremony, connected to the spirit of an animal. Then bulldozers come, wreak havoc and destroy trees (to build a dam). The native chief is killed, and the outsider will lead the fight with his tribe friends, some outside knowledge and technology (such as guns), and the help of forest animals (the frogs) and Mother Nature, to push out the white invaders. And he decides to stay in the forest at the end. And he falls in love with a native girl.
It all goes back to Campbell analysis. Like one movie with a thousand faces.
You forgot Disney's Atlantis... Both bad guys even look the same!
There's nothing completely original. Even the Iliad copied bits from previous stories.
Cameron got in trouble with _Terminator_ because he talked about it being inspired by two specific _Outer Limits_ (IIRC) episodes. One of the people he was talking to was a friend of Harlan Ellison, who wrote both episodes.
Three more - Ray Bradbury's short stories:
- Here There Be Tygers
- And the Moon Be Still as Bright
- Dark They Were, and Golden-eyed
A few people have compared the movie to my connected stories BLUE WAR, DEADSTOCK and IN HIS SIGHTS (all published by Solaris Books). One blogger directed me to his posts, drawing comparisons:
BLUE DEJA VU, from 1/3/10 http://daedahl.blogspot.com/2010/01/blue-deja-vu.html
And BLUE WORLDS REVISTED, from 1/9/10 http://daedahl.blogspot.com/2010/01/blue-worlds-revisited.html
" *both stories were told from the point-of-view of a disabled veteran (Jake Sully is a paraplegic in Avatar; while Jeremy Stake suffers from metamorphic paralysis in In His Sights)
*both protagonists travel to a jungle-like world populated by blue-skinned humanoids with almond shaped eyes (the Na'vi of Pandora; the Ha Jiin of the unnamed blue world)
*the blue-skins world is invaded by humanity solely for the acquisition of a rare and exotic subterranean resource (Pandora's ridiculously named mineral: Unobtainum; the Ha Jiin's strange subterranean gasses)
*on both worlds the mining of resources involves violating sites considered sacred by the blue-skins (Pandora's sacred trees containing the souls of their ancestors; the Ha Jiin's sacred burial catacombs)
*both protagonists were selected because their unique genome allowed them to assume the form of a blue-skin, infiltrate and gain access to said exotic resource (Jake Sully - his genetically engineered Avatar; Jeremy Stake - a mutant human with mild metamorphic abilities) "
I'm not claiming Cameron read my stories...as you say in the article, it's all just jolly good fun. ;-)
Thank you Jeffrey, great info - and kudos to all other commenters who unearthed a whole bunch of other references. Great fun!
Not classic science fiction but classic anime: Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind. Great movie with a couple of ideas which found their way into Avatar. For example the tree of soul's shimmering tentacles or the way the navi'i ride the dragons.
Thanks for these. I just wonder how to go about getting hold of these stories. Are they at all still in print?
The similarities between all these stories are probably more than coincidental or influencial. I'm guessing there are a historical references in play as well. Maybe the colonization of America, Africa and Australia. And the Gulf war references, "The hearts and minds" tour, "Shock and Awe" campaign, were too obvious to miss.
But yes, these Science fiction sources are fantastic.
Avatar was one of the best movies I have ever seen. James Cameron is the man when it comes to creating amazing movies!
Totally riped from the animated movie "Fern Gulley"...right down to the bulldozer scene!! Can anyone verify this ??? Is there not any origionality anymore??
My first thought was 'The Dragon riders of Pern' for the bonding between the dragons and their riders BUT, How about 'The Integral Trees' by Larry Niven?
FYI- Cameron said he drew from everything in his experience.
Abolutely beautiful-wonderful creatures and plants, esp. 'dragons'
@xJENOVAx uep. frank Herberts the Jesus incident/lazarus effect had a planet called PANDORA which was crawling with HOSTILE WILDLIFE, and a type of sentient kelp that had a networked COLLECTIVE CONSCIOUS
with the other creatures on the planet, just like in Cameron's movie. I think they referred to it as ¨avata¨
I think there was also genetically engineered CLONES that were adapted for the planet.
As an Indian, after watching the movie Avatar I felt like there were similarities to the Indian film Vietnam Colony (1992). Of course both these films are in different genres. But the basic storyline is the same.
Man gets hired by a corporation to get rid of a bunch of people settled in a rich land, so as the corporation could do their business in that land. Hence, the Man goes into this people's lives as someone who is a part of them. He falls in love with the local girl. And eventually becomes a part of the local people and fights back against the corporation.
Don't forget the giant tree community and feline heroine of 'The Stone God Awakens', by Jose Philip Farmer.
Avatar reminded me of a story I read in a school reader--don't remember if it was Junior or Senior High-- which depicted what appeared to be a "medieval village" that was in fear of the noise and smell of dragons that lived out in the forbidden forest which turn out to be heavy equipment/bulldozers of a colonizing work group. I can't remember the name of the author nor the title that it was excerpted from. Help me...anyone? I'd love to read it again!!!
*includes spoilers*
When I first saw Avatar I was outraged. I felt that James Cameron tore everything I loved out of my favorite book, changed things just slightly enough to not get sued and added Cameron-esque explosions and mechs all over. That book is “The Color of Distance” by Amy Thomson published in 1995 and now out of print. There is much more than a passing resemblance between the two. In both, the human main character wears the skin and appearance on an alien and learns about their race and culture. In both, the main character “goes native”. In both, the aliens hunt with primitive ranged weapons coated with poison. In both, the aliens live in harmony with nature and are appalled when humans destroy the jungle. In both, the aliens can link their minds with plants, animal and each other and can sent empathetic commands in that manner. In both, the aliens live inside massive hollow trees with columns and spiraling ramps grown from the tree itself. In both, huge predatory birds loom above the forest and don't hesitate to attack and eat the aliens. In the book, the main character's brother has his spine broken and becomes a quadriplegic. In the movie, the main character has a broken spine and is a quadriplegic.
There is a scene that is nearly identical in both the book and movie. In both, packs of lizard-dog creatures roam the jungle floor and attack the main character while they are lost in the jungle. In both, the main character defends themselves from the lizard-dogs by using a staff-like branch to injure and knock away the lizard-dogs but ends up being saved when an alien intervenes and scares the pack away. In both, the aliens are upset by the injuries inflicted on the lizard-dogs because of the human's carelessness.
I know “The Color of Distance” isn't a very common book, but I can't believe no one has called out Cameron for ripping of this book. Maybe it's because he changed just enough of the minor details that he can legally claim it as his own (such as using tentacle hair to link with others instead of wrist-spurs). Still it annoys me to no end to see ideas stolen.
I read a story back in the seventies about two agents who had their bodies altered in order to monitor a world that was on the edge of nuclear war. One of the agents, I think his name was Randall, broke protocol and got sucked into the local politics in an idealistic, naive way that almost ended in disaster. I've wished for a very long time that I could remember the name of the story and the author because I'd love to read it again. Any ideas would be appreciated.
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