By Gale Courey Toensing
NEW YORK – Filmmaker-turned-activist James Cameron said he will continue to help the global indigenous struggle and carry the message of his epic blockbuster 3D movie “Avatar” that “time is running out” for the dominant society to change its ways and stop destroying the environment.Cameron spoke to a audience of around 400 indigenous peoples at a special screening of “Avatar” at the Directors Guild of America Theater in New York April 24. The event took place during the annual meeting of the U.N. Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues from April 19 – 30.
“It’s a tremendous honor for me to be here and to have the members of the U.N. Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues here tonight. It’s such important work that you’re doing and I applaud what you’re doing. It’s so critical given how many indigenous cultures are under threat throughout the world. I think time is running out for our civilization to shift its set of values. That’s what I was trying to say with ‘Avatar.’”
“Avatar,” a runaway hit that has grossed more than $2.7 billion, tells the story of how a military-corporate invasion of the planet Pandora to mine the precious mineral “unobtanium” almost destroys the way of life of the Na’vi, the planet’s indigenous population.
The movie’s hero, Jake Sully, is a paraplegic marine working for the military-corporate complex who is sent to Pandora to gain the Na’vi’s trust and then betray them by persuading them to abandon the land where their enormous sacred tree is growing above a dense concentration of unobtanium. But Sully “goes Native,” falls in love with a beautiful Na’vi female and the traditional way of life, and turns against his fellow humans to lead the Na’vi in a successful armed resistance against the invaders.
Cameron said he and his wife Susan have been astonished at the number of people around the world who have asked for their help after seeing “Avatar,” “because so many people around the world working with indigenous issues have seen their reality in the film even though the film is a fantasy and takes place on a mythical world.”
As a boy, Cameron said, he spent much of his free time in the woods near his Canadian home where he felt a connection to nature. While he is not indigenous and had never previously worked with indigenous peoples, he is committed to helping their struggle to maintain and protect their territories.
“I’ve tried to live with a personal sense of responsibility in my life and through my art as a filmmaker and decided finally to say something to express my moral outrage at what is happening to the natural world and indigenous peoples, who are the best stewards for that natural world and find themselves caught at the tectonic interface between the expansion of our technical civilizations into the few remaining preserves, the remaining indigenous territories where we still have the highest biodiversity, but, unfortunately, where there are still resources in the ground that are to be dug up and plundered. That’s why for me it’s important to not just stop with the movie, but to keep talking about it and do things like this where we get together and talk about it.
“My wife said this is more than an opportunity; this is a duty,” Cameron said.
A panel discussion with indigenous journalists followed the screening. Kenneth Deer, a Mohawk journalist and consultant from Kahnawake, raised the issue of “Avatar’s” white male hero – a subject that has generated a lively debate among indigenous movie-goers.
“It seems every time there is a large movie like such as ‘Dances with Wolves,’ ‘Little Big Man,’ ‘Wind Talkers,’ the hero is always a non-indigenous person that becomes the savior; the same with the Na’vi. Why is that and will there ever be an indigenous hero who saves the indigenous people?” Deer asked.
Cameron said he recognized that the white male hero was “one of the backlashes against the movie.”
“The goal in making the film was not to try to tell indigenous peoples how bad things are for them. It’s trying to wake up Caucasian people to see the issues and anybody who’s essentially in the role of being the economic oppressor or invader. I understand the white Messiah argument, but in this movie I’m trying to make everybody a white Messiah. I want everybody to have a sense of responsibility to solve the problems.”
The evening began with a welcome to Cameron from Tonya Gonnella Frichner, Snipe Clan, Onondaga Nation, and the North American Representative of the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues.
“I’m going to do is welcome you . .. to the territory of the Haudenosaunee, and to remind you that you are walking and to walk gently on the bones of our ancestors and to let you know that we are welcoming you here to this beautiful Turtle Island and that you are among our leadership. We hope you enjoy being with us for the second week of the Forum on Indigenous issues. We send you our love and our peace.”
Cameron was inundated with praise, thanks, and many gifts including textiles from Colombia, Peru and Ecuador, a feathered headdress from West Papua, a whale’s tail to help him “be a strong man” from arctic Russia, beads, necklaces and a belt.
Chief Oren Lyons, Onondaga Nation Faithkeeper, thanked Cameron for “the great adventure” of “Avatar.”
“What this film has done is brought an awareness as with Al Gore’s film (‘An Inconvenient Truth’). He brought awareness, but this one follows right up in a broader way. It’s touched people around the world.”
Cameron said he was “overwhelmed” at the outpouring of support and gratitude.
“This evening, what you have organized and these wonderful gifts and the emotion of it, it means so much to me, more than anything Hollywood could offer, more than an Academy Award. … This is what you try to do as a filmmaker. You try to communicate, to create connections between people.”
Source: indiancountrytoday.com
