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A red carpet in Los Angeles. March 7, 2010: A handsome yet self-conscious Australian actor, who happens to have recently starred in the highest-grossing film of all time, is stopped for an interview while walking the red carpet at the Academy Awards.

When asked the mandatory question put to all Oscar attendees: “Your clothing, please discuss”, he replies “Payless Shoes and a friggin’ kick ass suit.” 
Quizzed as to the suit’s designer (it’s all about the labels, darling, hence the “who” and not “what” are you wearing) he shrugs “some bloke”.

Right on cue, the media in the actor’s homeland conclude this response to be proof of his down-to-earth appeal and marvel over his grounded, humble attitude amid a sea of Hollywood shallowness.

Continue reading "Wacko the diddle oh it’s a dead-set dinki di Avatar" »

At first it seemed as though becoming an Avatar would be a risky professional decision. I was hesitant about transferring my life-force into the body of a Na’vi alien body and moving to the planet Pandora.

Leaving earth would be hard: dying planet though it may be I’d still miss the new season of Big Love. Furthermore I hate using aeroplane toilets at the best of times so I thought holding it in over a five-year long haul spaceship flight would be a challenge.

Of course there are also immediate benefits: I would be taller and bluer beyond my wildest dreams (although to be honest I hadn’t previously fantasised too much about being 10-foot tall and blue). But really what sealed the deal was the lack of competition in the Pandora media market.

Continue reading "Why I became an Avatar" »

With nothing coming out of Copenhagen to rile the world’s anti-green conservatives, they’re aiming their Hummers at Avatar, James Cameron’s decade-later follow-up to Titanic.

For his right-of-centre critics, Cameron is a new Michael Moore; a manifestation elitist Hollywood whose 3D spectacular is filling kids’ minds with terrible ideas like greed is bad and green is good.

Miranda Devine wrote a few days ago in The Sydney Morning Herald that Avatar is infused with “Cameron’s sanctimonious hippie sensibility.” That’s right, the bloke who made Terminator and T2 – movies in which explosions and a Republican Governor save the day – is a hippie. It’s not hard to see why Devine et. al. are going after Cameron.

Continue reading "Avatar’s a film, not a call to take up arms" »

There’s a very good reason why James Cameron’s Avatar, also known as The Most Expensive Movie Ever Made, stars a couple of computer-generated blue humanoid aliens.

Simply put, the mega-budget 3D sci-fi spectacle has been designed with a sort of ‘calculated universality’ and its 10-foot, cat-eyed protagonists are a central part of that strategy.

Film production is a tight business and risk-averse Hollywood isn’t about to throw big money at a production unlikely to make big returns.

Continue reading "Why Avatar just might make its money back" »