Depiction Of The Impact Of Imperialism In The Movie Avatar
The movie “Avatar” written and directed by James Cameron is a remarkable movie that describes the impact imperialism has on innocent citizens. This movie is very similar to the imperialism that occurred in Africa during the 1870s. Both these cruel events show the audience how a group of people can conquer hinder land, due to all the advanced tech they hold.
As seen in the movie, when the Na’Vi’s realize what the sky-people are doing to their homeland, they seek war to end their destruction upon their sacred land. When they go to war, the Na’Vi’s outnumbered the sky people by 2,000 to 200 but lose the first half of the war because of their impede war equipment. This is similar to the Boer war that occurred in the 1870s because even though the Boers outnumbered the Europeans the Boers still lost the war because they were fighting guns and machine guns with bows and knives. This shows the audience how developed countries can conquer vast amounts of obstructing counties due to the war technology and equipment they possess.
Another way the movie describes imperialism is by showing the audience how the sky-people take no for an answer. In the movie when the protagonist Jake Sully turns into one of the Na’ vi’s and becomes one of them, he tries to tell them to migrate from the sacred tree so that the sky-people can mine, they say no because of how sacred the tree is to them. When Jake tells this to Colonel Miles Quaritch, he doesn’t care about the Na’Vi’s opinion and destroys their sacred land anyways since they didn’t obey his orders. This event is similar to what happened to the Africans when the Europeans first arrived in Africa because when the Africans disobeyed the Europeans commands they turned innocent citizens into slaves and separated them from their families. This shows how advanced countries don't care about hinder people’s opinions and give them one chance to escape their cruelty.
An additional way the movie describes imperialism is by showing us how advancing countries share their technology with the impede countries as a way to show gratitude towards them for abilities to mine in their homeland for valuable resources. At the beginning of the movie when Jake first syncs into his Avatar and steps outside, he can see all the Na’ vi’s learning the sky-people ways by playing sports, farming, learning their language, etc. In return, the sky-people wanted mining privileges but they didn’t grant it to them. This is similar to what happened in Africa during the 1870s because when the Europeans first arrived they tried to educate them, and show them cures to diseases for mining privileges. This shows how imperialism doesn’t always do badly for a country but also educates them on advanced tech.
