Avatar brings together a range of familiar themes, common threads, topics, symbolic references and cultural backgrounds and binds them together into a tight immersive adventure. It challenges our perception of the boundaries of reality and fantasy, and can provide us with a reminder of our purpose right here on Earth. Although there are many themes that are worthy of discussion, this review will mainly focus on Avatar’s use of rites-of-passage, and explore how these rites allow us to connect with a purpose and broaden our relationship with the natural world. Chapters are dived into ’seasons’ and link various threads in Avatar with the natural cycle of birth, growth, decay, death and rebirth. Familiar themes on an unfamiliar world.

Birth – A new world, a fresh start

Avatar opens by introducing the possibility of new beginnings. Through Jake’s narrated introduction, we discover how he came to arrive on Pandora and are likewise introduced to how frustrating his reality of being stuck in a wheelchair is. We also get to know his dreams of being whole again, and this theme of dreams re-occurs throughout the movie, as the boundaries between dream and reality blur once he starts embodying his avatar.

With its oceans, continents, ice and clouds, Pandora looks more like Earth than a land of the terrors and nightmares those familiar with the Greek myth might have been expecting. Perhaps the corporate men were right, this could be Jakes second chance, humanities wet-dream: a fresh planet where we can start-over and this time get things right. Pandora offers Jake the chance to leave the past behind and become someone new, the same way that Spring overcomes Winter and offers the chance for renewal and re-birth. Jake is eager to prove that he is useful, so he enthusiastically takes on the Colonel’s mission of spying on the Na’vi, because, for now, he only sees the benefit to himself. His desire to be whole again overshadows whatever consequences his actions may have on others.

The beauty of Pandora revealed

As Jake tests out his new Na’vi body, we witness the glee on his face as he fully immerses himself in the experience of being free of his chair. Yet, it cannot last. Waking up back in his cocoon, Jake is confronted once again by his useless human legs. While Jake’s human body appears to represent repression and the past, his avatar body symbolizes liberation, the future and freedom. In other words, the past represents childhood and the future symbolizes manhood.

This is stated clearly in the scene when he first meets Neytiri, “You know nothing! You are like a baby…” she points out. Although Jake possesses the body of an adult Na’vi male, to Neytiri he has not yet proven himself worthy of wearing their skin. To do so, he must think and behave accordingly. Neytiri however is not willing to dismiss Jake immediately, as we see. She possesses a deep spiritual connection to the forest and after witnessing a sign from Eywa, she realizes that there is something special about Jake. This spiritual connection is something that we see lacking from most of the humans in the movie, which raises questions about what connections we have perhaps lost to our own world.

Growth –Learning to love and respect our new skin

When Jake is brought before the clan elder Eytukan, he mistrusts Jake and agrees with the feisty young warrior Tsu’tey that Jake should be destroyed. Moat however, takes a more diplomatic approach and although she claims that they have already tried, and failed, to open the minds of the humans to the Na’vi ways, she makes an exception with Jake. As the spiritual leader of the clan, Moat believes that there is something special about him. She gives him the chance to learn the Na’vi way, challenging Jake to immerse himself fully in their culture, and train with an initially reluctant Neytiri in order to assess whether or not he can earn his place as one of them. As Jake takes deeper and deeper sojourns into the Na’vi culture, rites-of-passage are shown to be an integral part of the development of his character. Neytiri gives Jake various challenges, or ‘rites-of-passage’, that demonstrate that he is improving, learning and maturing. Like a snake sheds its skin, their first rite in initiating Jake into their clan is to remove his human-styled clothes. Barefoot and practically naked, his body is exposed to the elements and eyes of others, meaning that the focus is moved to his actions.

It is through Neytiri that Jake is introduced to the various habits, practices, rituals and language of the Na’vi, and it is with her that we witness the initial steps in the evolution of Jake’s character which snowball into the giant strides that he later takes.

To draw parallels with another great movie reviewed here, Neytiri – like Katsumoto in ‘The Last Samurai‘ – takes the role of mentoring Jake in the ways of the heart as much as the ways of the warrior. She teaches him about the deep spiritual connection the Na’vi have with the forest and its other inhabitants. As Jake gradually climbs the ladder of her respect, we are given the chance to reflect on our own lost cultures and traditions and can be reminded of times when men would have provided for the community as hunters, and defended them as warriors if needed. Another example of a tradition we are familiar with can be found in the funeral, a scene in which Neytiri is seen placing one of the sacred seeds in the grave of the Na’vi elder as Jake repeats her words in his diary dialogue, “All energy is only borrowed, and one day you have to give it back…”. This brings us full circle by asking us to compare this funeral scene to the one that Jake’s twin brother received at the beginning of the movie. Once again we see that the Na’vi have a healthy respect for death, which perhaps brings them in closer contact with the life they choose to lead.

Jake meets an Ikran for the first time

The Na’vi rites-of-passages are those of a hunter. His first clean kill grants him access to the test of the warrior, and he must climb Mount Iknimaya to make the bond with a banshee (Ikran) – a dangerous exercise where he could either die – or become a true warrior. But the title of ‘warrior’ is not the final step in becoming a man. After passing through the rites of a hunter, then a warrior, Jake’s ultimate challenge is to stand before the Na’vi community and be accepted as one of them. This conclusive action, the ritual of ‘laying of hands’ to form a connection with each clan member proves to each one of the Na’vi present that Jake is being reborn, and that after that moment he is accepted as one of them. This transformation can be witnessed in nature right here on Earth in examples such as the caterpillar becoming a moth or butterfly, or when a juvenile bird gains its adult colours.

Jake is now fit to wear the skin that he has been given. Another way to interpret this scene would be to say that he is now no longer a child. He is a man. The Na’vi use of rites pose other questions: how do our own societies qualify us as men? Are we ‘men’ simply because of our deeper voices, our taller, broader, hairier bodies? How do we actually know that we are now men and not still boys? And how do others know? What types of rites do boys have to pass through to be considered men in contemporary society? Is it the keys to our car? Our shavers? Our 18^th birthday? Our ability to legally buy alcohol? Or is it something much deeper: the knowledge of our purpose in life? These questions are definitely worth taking a moment to think about.

While watching, I also notice that Neytiri is not surrounded by weak male role models. This is no fairy-tale in which the whimsical princess sings to her animal friends while waiting for a handsome prince to whisk her away from the boredom of her claustrophobic room high in the Palace’s Eastern Tower. Neytiri is positive, powerful and very feminine. So when it comes to the question of love and partnership, Jake is intimately aware that it is not just his own personal choice as a man that matters: a life with a partner must be decided together and he states to Neytiri “I have already chosen, but she must also chose me”, another confirmation that Jake has transformed into a wiser man.

Decay – Leaves and trees fall, bodies waste away

While his Na’vi self improves in leaps and bounds, we witness Jake’s human side (especially his body) waste away and he grows increasingly pale and thin and stalls his mission of relocating the Na’vi from Hometree. Jake states that the lines between his old self and his new self are blurred, he is not sure who he is any more. Despite all that he has learned and the commitment that he has made to Neytiri and the Na’vi people, he is still attached to his human body and past. When the yellow bulldozers suddenly arrive and destroy the sacred site that he and Neytiri have just made love in, Jake finally sees what his fellow humans are doing through the eyes of his newly attuned Na’vi self and his true sense of purpose, to defend his home, kicks in. His uncontrolled rage exposes his true allegiance and the following negotiations between Grace, Jake, the Colonel and Selfridge do not go in favour of the Na’vi. Grace puts up an especially well-reasoned fight. She and Jake both display aspects of the KWML ‘Lover (in their fullness)’ during this scene, deeply in tune with Pandora’s beauty and unafraid of protecting it at any cost to themselves. But instead of taking their pleas seriously, Selfridge deflates their arguments by exclaiming “What have you guys been smoking!?!”. He appears completely disconnected from himself by the greed, denial and destruction that his everyday life has become. In KWML terms, Selfridge displays many aspects of the ‘The Tyrant King’ here, blinded by his hunger for richness he is unable to associate with the situation he has created:

The immature Selfridge commands Dr Grace Augustine to produce results with the Na’vi

His degradation of others and all beauty is limitless, as everything good, true, and beautiful reminds him of his own shortcomings. He is extremely sensitive to criticism… responding with rage, when what he feels is fear and vulnerability.

The Colonel too plays a role, the Sadist Warrior who itches for battle, he prefers mass genocide in order to acquire military rule over Pandora. As the military destroy Hometree, he too appears entirely disconnected from the reality that he is creating for the Na’vi: while they die or watch their home being destroyed, he sips coffee and offers to buy everyone a beer. Back at the base, Selfridge and the others watch their television screens passively, somehow connecting and disconnecting them at once. Norm and Trudy are the only ones who feel the need to act: Norm flies into a rage and Trudy simply walks away, wanting no part in the massacre of the people she too connects with. Small, but powerful actions.

Death – Redemption. The making of the king

With Eytukan dead, Tsu’tey steps up to his responsibility as clan leader – but, overwhelmed by the situation that he has been thrust into, he can do nothing more than lead the Na’vi retreat to the Tree of Life. It is finally time for Jake to take the initiative: the people need a leader they can trust to fight back and win against unthinkable odds. Using his training, Jake pulls off the unthinkable – makes the bond with Last Shadow (Toruk) and arrives to the awe of the collected Na’vi. As we watch this scene, we are reminded of what it often takes to make a true leader: as human beings we must pass through many hoops in life – many rites and rituals – but in order to become a true leader, one must often surpass the confines of mere mortals. Jake appears when the Na’vi most need him and as such, represents the 6th incarnation of their messiah, something that was also hinted at earlier when Jake was ‘chosen’ by the sacred seeds.

Jake turns to Tsu’tey and, brother to brother, man to man, asks for the new chief’s permission to bring the clans together to form a larger force. The show of respect for Tsu’tey’s position here is a good example of how Jake connects with the Na’vi. The warrior Tsu’tey recognizes a power in Jake that he does not yet possess and agrees to let Jake lead. War follows, and the Na’vi pack a mighty hole in the human forces. Tsu’tey’s heroic fight on the aircraft ramp is particularly noteworthy. But against the bullets and rockets, their fortunes quickly turn and the humans and their machines one-by-one lay waste to the Na’vi forces. But Jake’s call to Eywa for help is answered and various creatures come to the planet’s aid, giving Jake the break he needs to destroy both the airship and the Colonel’s battleship. Although it may appear cliché and obvious to point it out, what this scene does is once again show us that one man can make a huge difference, one man can turn the tide and fight for what he loves despite the fact that he can lose everything.

“How does it feel to betray your own people?” the Colonel asks Jake during the final battle. He doesn’t perceive that Jake’s connection goes far deeper than A) human, or B) Na’vi. Throughout the whole film, the Na’vi have played a very important role in allowing us to connect to the planet Pandora emotionally. The Na’vi have shown us the spirit of Pandora: Eywa, not as dark feminine seduction, but as a positive feminine energy source. One to bathe in, admire and respect. The Colonel’s disconnected analysis is not an uncommon one at all: while the natural world on our own planet is continuously raped, divided up and turned into corporate commodity, humans inherently continue to focus on human-centric issues and conflicts. To Jake – who has fully embraced his Na’vi spiritual side – the connection goes much further than this. He doesn’t even bother to respond to the Colonel’s challenge. He just snarls like a cat and goes in for the kill.

Re-birth – The cycle of life comes full circle

As Neytiri enters the cabin hoping to save the suffocating Jake, she meets Jake in his human body for the first time. They finally ‘see’ one another as their true selves. There is something both strange and wonderful about this scene as the massive battle-painted warrior princess crouches in the tiny steel and plastic lab, cradling Jake’s body like a baby in her huge arms. These two scales, of small and large (child and adult) are also much clearer in the final scene as Jake’s two bodies lie in the fetal position, one symbolizing that of a child and the other that of a grown man. Reborn one final time, the boy becomes a man, permanently.

Conclusion

Avatar takes us half-way cross the galaxy, to the wondrous world of Pandora. But like always, when we transition out of make-believe worlds of great wonder, reality smacks us in the face.

The question to ask yourself is this: ‘What reality do I now see?’ Can Avatar show you how wonderful the world that surrounds you is – outside of your car, your house, your office and even your clothes? For me, Avatar is a call to action, it strikes deeply and asks us one essential question about our lives: what is our core purpose? It hints at the benefits of deepening our current personal connection to people, the natural world around us and the spiritual side of that connection we may have lost touch with. It tells a story that challenges us to analyse the consequences of action versus inaction when we see a cause that is worth fighting for.

It is a story that reminds us that we simply can’t sit around and wait for the future to solve the problems of the present. Deep down this is a story that shows us that we are capable of evolving from boys – through several rites of passage – to the final rite of being reborn as true men, of wearing this skin – this form of the adult male that we have so fortunately grown into – with pride. To take responsibility for our own actions, fight for what is right and protect our mother, ‘Earth’, from those that would harm her.

And most of all, it asks us to do something very simple: to see ourselves through the eyes of others and to stand confidently under their gaze without fear, because we understand who we are and our true purpose right here and now.

An old associate pops up and talks of great opportunities: Mr. Omura, a wealthy and powerful Japanese entrepreneur, has arrived in America to seek Nathan’s expertise in high-tech warfare. Omura is in charge of the modernization of Japan and needs help to quell a brewing Samurai uprising which is holding back the tide of change.

Japan is at this point in history at a crossroads where age-old feudal tradition is challenged by the unstoppable force of modernization. For a thousand years, the feudal system has existed under the watchful gaze of the Samurai, the elite warriors who served their lords with their life. The Japan that greets Nathan, however, has already been heavily westernized: Japanese in bowler hats walk side by side with westerners, Samurai are eyed with suspicion and angst, and American guns have found their way into the the emperor’s Imperial Army.

It is this army that Nathan is charged with training. He is only, he claims, there for the money – 500 dollars a month – for which, he says cynically to Colonel Bagley “I will kill whoever you want.” Understand and absorb that this is true for Nathan only from his place of confusion. Deep inside, at a core place that the darkness of his conscience has blocked off, he doesn’t feel this way at all. There is a hidden message here for us: When our minds are clouded by the weight of our actions, we make decisions based solely on superficial gain. Equipped with an untrained mind ravaged by guilt, we are unable to see the greater implications of our decisions. This peripheral vision is required to comply with the golden rule for the mature man: Make sure all of your actions flow within the context of serving others.

Training the Imperial Army

The Imperial Army that Nathan discovers is a ragtag bunch of conscripts. They aren’t skilled with firearms and they aren’t psychologically prepared for battle with the Samurai. Colonel Bagley happily ignores this due to his naïve arrogance and wants them to attack. The Colonel is an emotionally shut down soldier, a man with no sense of honor, ill-equipped to understand the heart of a true Warrior. Like anyone with little understanding of the inner realms, he puts way too much emphasis on external circumstances – rifles and howitzers over swords and arrows – and disregards the primal force that can exist deep in a man whose actions are in alignment with his higher calling.

Nathan is wiser and reminds Colonel Bagley that while the Samurai may not have modern weaponry, they are elite warriors whose “sole occupation for a thousand years has been war”. Wishing to prove Col Bagley wrong, Nathan challenges one of the imperial soldiers to shoot at him, informing him that lest he complies, his life is forfeit. Nathan has no love for his life and is willing to risk it to prove a point to the man who has caused him so much anguish.

The showdown which ensues ends in slaughter. In a beautifully shot scene, shadows appear from the mist before Nathan’s fidgeting and undisciplined troops. Horses emerge in full gallop, swirling fog in their hoof steps, and the Samurai barrel through the panicking conscripts. After dropping several Samurai, Nathan is captured by Katsumoto, the Samurai Lord he was sent to defeat.

Healing the wounds of the past

Nathan is brought to a mountain village, where he ends up in the care of Katsumoto’s sister Taka, a woman he has just widowed. I am left to wonder why Nathan ends up in the household where they have most reason to hate him, but I think that the wise Katsumoto is lucidly aware of the healing potential in pairing Nathan with the widowed family. It’s also clearly used as a vehicle for the film-makers to show another way of relating to death, one steeped in acceptance, honor, and emotional restraint instead of wild hatred and uncontrolled grief.

Nathan’s recovery from the wounds he has been inflicted by the Samurai is interspersed with scenes from the atrocities he committed against the Cheyenne. The healing process described in these short movie minutes is particularly significant and universally applicable. Consider that in every man’s life, there is an accumulation of a burden of ignorantly or maliciously committed actions. For the more sensitive, truth-seeking souls (such as Nathan) this burden results in terrible inner conflicts, depression, self-loathing, perhaps even suicidal tendencies. For the more hardened, truth-denying souls, such as Colonel Bagley, the burden is hidden under a hard shell of self-protection, there to be discovered in the unlikely event that the shell is cracked.

It is the man who is experiencing the pain of this burden openly who is ready to be taught, ready to be transformed by life’s lessons. The lances that pierced Nathan’s flesh are the psychological wounds made manifest in his physical body. He has been given these wounds in honorable conflict as a direct consequence of his own actions. Karmically speaking, the actions Nathan took against the Cheyenne were of such a malicious nature that his own soul has demanded his punishment ever since. This feeling of deserving punishment is, I believe, why he turned to drinking. Only now that the Samurai have blessed him with truthful and honorable wounds does his karma from the Cheyenne start untangling. He can begin to heal.

It is important to extract from this the following insight: When pain and suffering arise in our lives, it is not something that “just happens” to us. Rather, these painful feelings are based on our (un)involvement in past events, and must not to be viewed merely as the burden of life. On the contrary, they are a sacred offering to us, exactly – EXACTLY – the raw material by which our own transformation is forged. This understanding, when integrated in any man, creates a sense of spaciousness around the pain (which remains) for it is now an ally, the Great Alchemist. This should be a cause of great joy. I ask you, what would this principle mean in your personal life? For Nathan, it means the beginning of his rebirth.

Surrendering to Ujio’s sword

Nathan is not only a prisoner, but a subject of study for Katsumoto and his men. One of these men is Katsumoto’s Lieutenant Ujio. Ujio is a master of the sword with contempt for the newly arrived American prisoner. He harbors a desire to break him and is left frustrated that he cannot do it. There is a scene in which Ujio commands Nathan to put down his sword. Nathan is standing solemnly in the middle of a village street, clasping onto a wooden sword. The sky has opened wide with rain. Nathan does not comply. I feel here that this scene communicates not just a clash of men but of cultures. Nathan’s culture is one he has come to know as dishonorable, yet it is his culture. And he will not embrace a foreign one, neither as a man nor as a citizen, without a fight.

The outcome is predestined. Nathan gets beaten to the ground, and rises to be beaten yet again. And again. His resilience is the American resilience, but his desire to be beaten is his alone. It is in this painful encounter with Ujio that Nathan begins the surrender of himself to a culture that is not his own. A culture, he may hope, contains promise of redemption.

Perfection in a cherry blossom

“The perfect blossom is a rare thing, you could spend your whole life looking for one, and it would not be a wasted life,” Katsumoto tells Nathan with deep appreciation in his voice as he arrives at the ancestral temple. The previous night, during a theatre play in the village, masked ninjas appeared on the rooftops. Nathan and Katsumoto now have each other to thank for their lives, and their bond as brothers in arms has been firmly established.

By this point in the movie, we have seen the many facets of Katsumoto. Not only is he an elite Warrior, he is a meditating mystic (Magician archetype), a Samurai lord (King archetype), a poet and a clown (Lover archetype). He is all of the four archetypes of the KWML system rolled into one character. He is a true master, a template of masculine potential.

“To know life in every breath, every cup of tea, every life we take. The Way of the Warrior. That is Bushido!, ” Katsumoto insists with fierce intensity and heartfelt devotion as he looks at Nathan. It is precisely this emphasis on life mastery and disciplined observation of the miracle – a cherry blossom – of life, that is missing from the contemporary Western soldier. It takes no training to kill a man with a gun, but a lifetime of training to deal with the psychological and spiritual consequences. The Samurai believed rifles and other Western arms were dishonorable, because they believed in looking the man you were about to slay straight in the eyes. I agree and have touched on this in my treatment of Lord Of War.

The end of the Samurai, the last Warriors

Inevitably the Imperial Army under the command of Colonel Bagley and Omura faces off with the Samurai on the battlefield. By now, Nathan has taken his rightful place among them and has reclaimed his honor. In spite of his close relationship with Katsumoto, Emperor Meiji has not found the strength in himself to take a stand in the conflict, and Omura has called the shots. Katsumoto grieves deeply for this, and believes that he is serving the Emperor even as he is preparing to go to war against him. From this I learn that the Warrior archetype is in relationship with only the deepest potential in his fellow man and that he may choose to ignore the words or deeds of his surface meandering. This, I believe, is what honor looks like.

The Samurai put up a spectacular and valiant fight, sending Omura into panic and Colonal Bagley into eternity. But in the end, they are vanquished by gatling guns. Centuries of tradition, lifetimes of discipline and spiritual searching, destroyed in one day by peasants with guns. As Nathan aids Katsumoto in performing his Seppuku, he looks in wonderment at the cherry blossoms, tears in his eyes. His training and honorable ways have paid off and the last words to cross his lips are the words of a Lover, “Perfect, they are all perfect.”

The Imperial Army, understanding what they have done and witnessed, prostrate themselves before the fallen Samurai. This is a very moving scene that is symbolic of the time in history when the Warrior drew his last breath and the soldier emerged as the dominant force on the battlefield. It was the time in history when we buried the discipline of life mastery in favour of dishonorable but efficient technology.

Conclusion

The Last Samurai is no doubt a heavily romanticized portrayal of the Samurai. Yet it does a terrific job of describing a way of life based on a set of core principles, Bushido, that should serve as a foundation for any mature man, even today. It also reminds me of Robert Bly’s insistance on how important it is to give the Warrior the sensibilities of the Lover. The Warrior and the Lover rolled into one: Europe had Chivalry, Japan had Samurai. Now we have soldiers who end up psychologically traumatized due to the dishonor of modern warfare. Yet, in each of us, the spirit of Bushido lives on, if only as a potential. Nathan’s journey has valuable lessons for the man who is prepared to reclaim what is rightfully his.

There is a Celtic saying that goes something like this “Do not give a man a sword before he has learned to dance.” I have a new saying for you: “Do not give a man a gun before he has found perfection in a cherry blossom.” You can quote me on that if you want.