January 19, 2010
Luminous 3-D Jungle Is a Biologist’s Dream
From The New York Times:
When watching a Hollywood movie that has robed itself in the themes and paraphernalia of science, a scientist expects to feel anything from annoyance to infuriation at facts misconstrued or processes misrepresented. What a scientist does not expect is to enter into a state of ecstatic wonderment, to have the urge to leap up and shout: “Yes! That’s exactly what it’s like!” So it is time for all the biologists who have not yet done so to shut their laptops and run from their laboratories directly to the movie theaters, put on 3-D glasses and watch the film “Avatar.” In fact, anyone who loves a biologist or may want to be one, or better yet, anyone who hates a biologist — and certainly everyone who has ever sneered at a tree-hugger — should do the same. Because the director James Cameron’s otherworldly tale of romance and battle, aliens and armadas, has somehow managed to do what no other film has done. It has recreated what is the heart of biology: the naked, heart-stopping wonder of really seeing the living world.
The real beauty of it, though, is that you do not have to be a scientist to enjoy the experience. “Avatar” is well within reach of becoming the highest-grossing film of all time. And while the movie’s dazzling animation and use of 3-D has received so much attention, it cannot be anything but the intense wonder so powerfully elicited, rather than merely the technical wizardry itself, that has people lining up to see it.
More here.
Posted by Azra Raza at 05:56 AM | Permalink
Comments
Hollywood, having already transformed movies into comics, goes one step further and transforms comics into video games. Plot, pacing, humanity, subtlety, humor or dialog above a grade 5 level? All unobtainium. Better to leave this Pandora's box unopened.
Posted by: J.H. | Jan 19, 2010 10:46:29 AM
Ha! A biologists dream...maybe the forests of Pandora appeal to the ecologists out there, but as a molecular bench scientist I had laugh out loud when I saw Sigourney Weaver fumbling with a micropipette in one of the lab sequences. She was using the entire pipette shaft, without tip attached mind you, to stir a fluorescent mixture. Truly classic!
Posted by: Tim C | Jan 19, 2010 3:45:21 PM
I guess I see what you mean, but I'm much less enthusiastic. The movie wasn't that good.
I was wondering what the explanation would be for the floating rock-island, I guess they were small moons or meteors locked in gravitational position by the large planet? What is the explanation? Would their orbit really be stable enough to povide tarzan vines? Wouldn't any flaura at that higher altitude be much different from the ground level?
A little too much blue and flourescence for me, but it did play on the natural excitement of seeing a glowworm, so wondrous because we don't glow.
They definitely should produce a video game that you can wander around in, to make people that were quite moonstruck happy.
The plot and characters were really lame.
Why would a deer-like creature evolve to have 6 legs? I'm pretty sure there are no equivalents on earth. That seemed like a glaring error to me when I saw it.
Also with all of the dinosaur-like creatures how do you explain the rise of mammals?
What is up with the hook up thing? Again, any equivalent on earth? That seemed like a really far-fetched stretch that so many various creatures would have hook-up thingamydoodads. That would mean that a very early evolutionary ancestor had it for so many modern creatures to possess it. Who did the first amoeba hook too? Really, did two divergent creatures evolve the hook up thingy at the same time? Not likely. Telekenesis would have been more believeable.
Saw on Charlie Rose that Cameron did talk about biology consultants helping to flesh-out the biosphere, though.
Posted by: odysseus14 | Jan 19, 2010 4:13:44 PM
@JH: Kinda funny at a time when many video games are finally moving beyond shitty writing (although admittedly, often struggling to pair good gameplay and good writing).
Posted by: Jazz | Jan 20, 2010 8:13:26 PM
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