Avatar_ Nguyen Phuong 11E20

Vietnam National University, Hanoi
University of Languages and International Studies
Faculty of English Teacher Education
Class: 11E20
Full name: Nguyễn Thị Phương

CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF THE FILM "AVATAR" IN THE LIGHT OF
INTERCULTURAL COMMUNICATION


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The film "Avatar" is a science fiction film written and directed by James
Cameron, starring Sam Worthington, Zoë Saldaña, Stephen Lang, Michelle
Rodriguez, and Sigourney Weaver. Released by 20th Century Fox on December
2009, Avatar is really a successful movie in American which earned an estimated
$27 million on its opening day and an estimated $77,025,481 domestically its
opening weekend. Worldwide, the film grossed an estimated $232,180,000 its
opening weekend, the ninth largest opening-weekend gross of all time, and the
largest for a non-franchise, non-sequel and original film. It is also considered to
be a front-runner for awards and nominations at the 82nd Academy Awards. So
far, it has been nominated to 4 Golden Globes, 2 of which it won: Best Director
and Best Motion Picture (Drama).
The film tells the story of Jake, former U.S. Marine paralysed from the waist
down in combat, and his fellows in Avatar Program in 2154. Jake Sully (Sam
Worthington), a due to wounds sustained in combat, is selected to participate in
the Avatar Program which is planned by the Resources Development
Administration(RDA), a non-governmental organization back on Earth
controlling colony personnel and military. The duty was previously filled by his

identical twin brother Tom Sully, who was recently killed by a man attempting
to rob him of his money. Firstly, Jake meets Colonel Miles Quaritch, a hardened
and seasoned military veteran in charge of security on the colony as well as


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welcoming the new personnel and military soldiers and briefing them on
Pandora a place which is mostly covered with lush rainforests and wildlife, and
is the home to the primitive Navi, a sentient race of tall, blue-skinned
humanoids. In this program, Dr. Grace Augustine, a botanist, at the same time,
the leader of the Avatar Program allows humans to control avatars genetically
engineered human-Navi hybrids who look like Navi to approach them.
Previously, Grace and her team have made some remarkable progress teaching
some Navi their ways and English as well as learning their language and culture
by using the avatars. Grace is not pleased with RDA administrator Parker
Selfridge's decision to use Jake to replace his brother’s avatar position, as she
will have to spend time training him in Navi culture as well as teaching him how
to control his avatar. However, Parker stresses that huge deposits on Pandora can
enable them to find the extremely valuable mineral unobtanium. At the same
time, Quaritch makes Jake his informant to gather information on the Navi and
their home, the Hometree with huge deposits of unobtanium deep below its
surface. He wants Jake to gain their trust and convince them to leave their home
within three months. After using avatar, Jake comes to Pandora and meets Greyti
who then teaches her how to fit in Pandora. Gradually, he falls in love with
Greyti and people there. He does not want to keep the plan and try in vain
persuade RDA not to attack Navi with weapons. After that, he together with
some teammates (Grace and ) and Navi people fight against RDA and also failed



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as Quaritch makes him awake.
I chose Avatar for my final essay because of two reasons. Firstly, the film
implies such meaningful and profound messages about humanity for us human
race. The first lesson is that we should not take everything of others such as their
homes or relatives for such things’ importance to them. If we do, they will try to
the last breath to fight against. Furthermore, Pandora in the film is like a new
place with a new culture that we need to learn how to “fit” ourselves into it
before we want to do anything like studying or working there. Beside humanity
messages, I can see clear evidences of some concepts in intercultural
communication such as adaptation and belief which can help me gain better and
deeper understanding about the subject.
The rest of the essay consists of three parts as follows. Part 1 is about
adaptation and examples from the films. The next part will continue with beliefs
and also examples from the films. Last but not least, there will be conclusions
and implications from the film and two above concepts.
As we know that “adaptation is the process by which people establish and
maintain relatively stable, helpful, and shared relationships with other upon
relocating to an unfamiliar cultural setting”. (Kim, 2001, p. 31).This film clearly
shows Jake’s adaptation process in Pandora for the assigned duty. First and
foremost, he has to use avatars that are genetically engineered human-Navi
hybrids that look like the Navi to approach them. Then he has to learn how to


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“fit” himself in Pandora. The adaption process through the film is like three
steps in the book Intercultural Communication: culture shock, U-curve and Wcurve.
At first, Jake experienced culture shock at the first time putting his first foot

on Pandora. He was curious and shocked at the features of the nature and was
then strongly attacked as he did not listen to his friend’s advice no to should the
animals. Culture shock, one of the most powerful, practical, and productive
concepts in the field of intercultural communication, is described as the
physical, psychological, and behavioral reactions that often occur when
individuals are attempting to live, work, or study in unfamiliar cultural contexts.
Culture shock remains a core concept within the fields of anthropology,
psychology, and intercultural communication, and is almost universally
referenced in orientation and re-entry training in both education abroad (Church
1982) and corporate contexts (Black and Mendenhall 1991).
Also, in almost all the scenes, he was very curious and then surprised at
everything especially the nature and what the Navi do when being taught by
Neytiri. They are all extremely strange to him which made him unhappy.
However, gradually, with a positive attitude, he learned everything successfully.
This step is the typical sign of U-curve hypothesis by Lysgaard (1955):
“Adjustment as a process over time seems to follow a U-shaped curve:
adjustment is felt to be easy and successful to begin with; then follows a 'crisis'


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in which one feels less well adjusted, somewhat lonely and unhappy; finally one
begins to feel better adjusted again, becoming more integrated into the foreign
community.” (1955: 51).
There are some scenes in which Jake came back the earth and felt unfamiliar
with the life here as well as what he had taken for granted before that for a long
time he had not practiced. Such signs are called W-curved. This is the
phenomenon in which a second wave of culture shock so-called re-entry shock
may occur when individual returns home and must readapt to the once taken-forgranted practices that can no longer be followed. The adaption process of Jake is
totally natural as theory I have learned so far which also is actually a real

example for the theory.
The second concept strongly reflected in the film is “belief”. Samovar and
Porter (1997) pointed out that “Beliefs are the judgments we make about what is
true or probable. They are usually linked to objects or events that posses certain
characteristics that we believe to be true with or without proof”. In the film,
when first meeting Jake- a Sky person, Neyriti intended kill him, but she did not
when she saw some flowers flying around him, as she believed they are signs of
Eywa- the guiding force and deity of Pandora and the Navi. The Navi believe
that Eywa acts to keep the ecosystem of Pandora in perfect equilibrium without
needing any real evidence. Navi people also believe in the Tree of Souls- a giant
willow-like tree that is said to be the closest connection to Eywa on Pandora.


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The tree is a point of extreme spiritual significance to the Navi, more so than
any other point on Pandora. They call it Tree of Souls because they believe that
the "voices" of ancestors could be "heard" there through neural queue contact
with the tree and the tree can be the witness for them when they choose their
mates. This, however, seems to be ridiculous for Quaritch and his staffs.
Although “Avatar” is only a science fiction film, it critically points out issues
concerning important intercultural communication that actually happen in our
global integration. By comparing the two different society of American with a
practical lifestyle, and the Navi society with strong spiritual life, we can see that
there is nothing true or false, inferior or superior in considering each culture. In
general, intercultural communication still addresses many complicated issues
and we need how to “fit” ourselves in others’ cultures and at the same respect
their cultures.



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References
Church, Austin T. 1982. “Sojourner Adjustment.” Psychological Bulletin 91,
3:540–572.
Black, J. Stewart, and Mark Mendenhall. 1991. “The U-Curve Adjustment
Hypothesis

Revisited: A Review and Theoretical Framework.” Journal of

International Business Studies 22, 2:225–247.
Kim, Y. Y. (2001). Becoming Intercultural: An Integrative Theory of
Communication and Cross-Cultural Adaption, 31, Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage
Lysgaard, Sverre. 1955. “Adjustment in a Foreign Society: Norwegian
Fulbright Grantees Visiting the United States.” International Social
Science Bulletin7:45–51.
Samovar, L. A., & Porter, R. E. (Eds.). (1997). Intercultural communication: A
reader (eighth ed.). Belmont, Ca: Wadsworth Publishing Company