Marc Ong 2i218

The Avatar vs Hurt Locker Oscar battle is a classic David vs Goliath battle. Although both have been nominated for 9 Academy Awards, the similarity between them ends there. Avatar had a budget of $237 million dollars to produce and grossed $2.2 billion dollars. On the other hand, The Hurt Locker had a budget of $11 million dollars and grossed $16 million dollars. Adding further to the irony is the directors. James Cameron directed Avatar, while his ex-wife Kathryn Bigelow directed The Hurt Locker.

--SPOILER WARNING--

Avatar is a film about a disabled ex-marine who goes to the planet Pandora to research the Na'vi and eventually realises how the cruel corporations there harvesting an alternative energy source are destroying the Na'vi people. He then allies with the Na'vi, having occupied his "Avatar" as a full-grown Na'vi male, and drives the humans off the planet.

The Hurt Locker, on the other hand, is a film about a Explosive Ordnance Disposal unit in Iraq. It follows their daily lives as they defuse bombs throughout Baghdad. The film opens as Sergeant William James replaces the killed in action Sergeant Thompson as leader. The majority of the film follows the team defusing various bombs. Although this may seem pointless, this is actually to develop the character of James. In the film, James is established as a seemingly reckless leader who disregards protocol. The film is, without a doubt, the most tense and exciting movie I have ever seen and every mission that the team went on kept me on the edge of my seat. Near the end of the film, one of his team members is sent home after being injured by friendly fire as an indirect result of James' recklessness, and the other one has mentally broken down, realizing he can no longer handle the stresses of war. As James is shown returning to civilian life to his broken marriage after being rotated, he explains to his son how there is only one thing left in life that he loves. The film ends showing James having signed up for the military again and back in Iraq.

--END SPOILER WARNING--

I know that some of you are thinking that I am being one-sided, have summarised Avatar(almost 3 hours in length) in 2 sentences, while devoting a huge paragraph to the two hour plus Hurt Locker. The simply reason is that I feel that Avatar's plot has nothing worth elaborating on. The characters are generic, their interactions are generic, and the plot is quite frankly, for all its eye-candy, too predictable. In my opinion, the underdog deserves to win.

And that is what I feel about the Avatar vs Hurt Locker debate.