Whether real or imaginary there is an inextricable link between the creation of films and the development of our built

environment. 1 Maggie Toy, Architecture Design

Maggie Toy, and others. (Nov/Dec 1994). AD Profile 112. Architecture & film. Architectural Design. no. 11/12 (64), p. 6

Blade Runner
In November 1994, the Architectural Design journal featured a collection of articles dedicated to architecture and cinematography.2 The collection included a critique on Ridleys Scotts Blade Runner, a film that was later showcased in a season of architecture and film at BFI Southbank for RIBAs 175th birthday. Blade Runner is based on a Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? a science fiction novel by American writer Philip K. Dick. 3The films visual artists made some interesting speculations regarding architecture in the early 21st century4, and the film has been a popular subject of discussion among architects and critics of postmodern culture since its release in 1982. Set in Los Angeles in 2019, the film presents a decaying cosmopolitan city set firmly in a dystopian style (see Fig. 1). A cityscape covered in a deep brown fog and constant rain creates a claustrophobic atmosphere, and suggests a possible change in climate in the future. Multiculturalism is the dominant force on the urban environment, with punks, Hare Krishnas, Arabic-sounding music, East-Asian influences, and the predominance of non-English language. In the opening scene one character, Gaff, addressed the character of Deckard in Cityspeak, a fictional language made up of Spanish, Japanese, German, Hungarian, Chinese and French. Sweeping shots of Los Angeles show the massive skyline dominated by pyramids and the monolithic headquarters of giant corporations, in particular the Tyrell Corporation, with tall towers belching flames, emulating the nightmarish city of Fritz Langs Metropolis5.
2 3

Ibid., p23 Dick, Philip K. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?. Philip K. Dick. http://www.philipkdick.com. Assessed on 22th April 2011
4 5

Abrams, Janet. (Sept 1982). Slicing into the future: Ridley Scott's new film 'Blade Runner' makes some interesting speculations about 21st century architecture. Building design. no. 611. 24, p. 16-17. Meades. Jonathan. (Sept 1982). Future retrospective: Ridley Scott's latest fantasy film 'Blade Runner' is essential viewing for all architectural post-modernists. Architects Journal. vol. 176, no. 38, p. 28-29.

Geisha billboards and advertising blimps dominate the streets, creating the impression of a world controlled by consumerism and multinational corporations that are becoming as powerful as many nation states, blurring the line between private and social organisations (i.e. the government) as leaders of control. This image is reinforced by the traffic, which is made up almost entirely by police vehicles.

Fig. 1: Blade Runner 1982. Decaying cosmopolitan city of Los Angeles in 2019.

In the films cyberpunk vision of the future, mankind has developed the technology to create replicants, human clones designed with a limited lifespan and used as a workforce to serve on colonies outside Earth. The films protagonist, Deckard, is a blade runner, a police officer who specialises in terminating replicants that have illegally abdicated their jobs. In retirement at the beginning of the film, he is forced to re-enter the force when four replicants escape from an off world colony to come to Earth.6 To untrained eyes, the biomechanical replicants are indistinguishable from humans, calling into question the distinction between human and robotic consciousness.7 The films ending also contains clues that suggest Deckard himself may be a replicant, though this question has never been definitively answered.
6 7

Graeme, Roy. (n.d). Plot Summary for Blade Runner. The IMDb Movies Database. [online]. Available from: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0083658/plotsummary [Assessed: 2nd May 2011] Abrams, Janet. (Sept 1982). Slicing into the future: Ridley Scott's new film 'Blade Runner' makes some interesting speculations about 21st century architecture. Building Design. no. 611, p. 16-17.

By depicting rapid advances in technology and the impact of industrialisation (referenced by the image of flaming smokestacks), television, computers and information technology (which can enhance the efficiency and power of surveillance techniques), Blade Runner provides a prediction of a more globalised world, reminiscent of the bio-systems addressed by Marshall McLuhans theories in Network Fever.

Even though the film made predictions about the future, most of these were retrospective, calling on precedents and influences from the past and present, such as the architectural group Archigram, Metropolis and John Martins apocalyptic painting A Vision of Architecture of Heaven. 8 However, Ridley Scott is not the only director to have taken inspiration from the past to make predictions about the future.

Meades. Jonathan. (Sept 1982). Future retrospective: Ridley Scott's latest fantasy film 'Blade Runner' is essential viewing for all architectural post-modernists. Architects Journal. vol. 176, no. 38, p. 28-29.

The nature of Pandora

Though there have been countless documentaries covering issues of nature and development, they have never able to catch public imagination and are always limited to a niche audience according to Utpal Borpujari.9 James Camerons film Avatar takes up the issue of industrial development versus environmental considerations in a more accessible way, and in particular through its portrayal of the landscape, ecology and native inhabitants (called the Navi) of its setting. Set on Pandora, an imaginary moon revolving around the planet Polyphemus in the Alpha Centauri star system (see Fig. 2), the film portrays an fictional landscape of magical floating peaks, revealed by the films designers to have been inspired by the 3,544ft Southern Sky Column in China10 (see Fig. 3). Pandora is shown to have an incredibly diverse tropical environment, with flora that blends features of Earths mammals, reptiles and birds, and a large collection of flora. This environment is reminiscing to earths prehistoric nature and extinct dinosaurs. The living creatures of Pandora are all connected as part of a neural network that allows them to coexist and even unite in battle against the intrusive human invaders. The landscape of Pandora is uncultivated by any kind of farming, as the Navi forge food they find among the fauna and flora, whilst maintaining a delicate balance with the surrounding ecosystem. With a preindustrial environment, no automated technology is present on Pandora until the arrival of humans from Earth. Both Earth and Pandora have water, as well as temperate and tropical climates, though Pandoras atmosphere is chemically different to Earths and requires the humans to wear special apparatus in order to breathe because of the lack of oxygen
9

Borpujari, Utpal. (2010). Avatars important message: Respect nature. [online] February 28 2010. Available from:

Deccan Herald.com http://www.deccanherald.com/content/42370/avatars-important-message-respect-nature.html [Assessed: 2nd May 2011]

10

BBC News. (2010). China renames 'Avatar' mountain in honour of film. [online] Available from:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/8480954.stm [Assessed: 2nd May 2011]

in the Pandora atmosphere. However it was only two aeons ago when photosynthetic bacteria first made oxygen in our atmosphere. It is now the dominant atmospheric gas on Earth11 and the most essential for all living things.

Fig. 2: Avatar 2009. Pandora.

11

Capra, Fritjof. The web of life: a new synthesis of mind and matter. London: HarperCollins, 1996. p.102

Fig. 3: Southern Sky Column, China.

Pandoras collection of fauna and flora has strong resemblances to those living in present-day Earth12 (see fig.4- 11)

Fig. 4: Pandora predators. Viperwolves

Fig. 5: Earth mammals. Minks.

12

Anon. (n.d). The real science of Avatar. TIME Magazine. Available from

http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1983917_2128761,00.html [Assessed:2nd May 2011]

Fig. 6: Pandora zooplantae. Helicoradian

Fig. 7: Earth flora. Christmas Tree Worm

Fig. 8: Pandora. woodspirits.

Fig. 9: Earth sea creatures. Deep-Sea Jellyfish

Fig. 10: Pandora. Neural Network

Fig. 11: Biological brain of a rats neurons

Navi natives and human tribe societies

To what extent do the Navi natives resemble a human society? Avatar shows the Navi living in their natural habitat on Pandora, engaging in activities such as travelling through the forest, following trails, practicing archery and eating and drinking, similar to the activities conducted by typical tribe societies and hunter-gatherers on Earth. We also see the Navi participating in ceremonies at the tree of souls, worshiping the spirits of their deceased ancestors and their goddess Eywa. This form of worshipping is reminiscent of the practice of animistic religion, i.e. the worshiping of some kind of metaphysical entities (such as souls or spirits) that are seen as the lifesource (or life-force) of human beings, animals, plants and even non-living objects and phenomenon. 13 Avatar portrays the Navi as an indigenous species who share some morphologic qualities with humans. The Navi are not the dominant hunters on Pandora; we know this because they sleep in hammocks in trees out of reach of creatures below, and are seen elsewhere escaping from larger creatures. One similarity with tribal societies is that some Navi die at birth and are susceptible to disease. By contrast, humans are the dominant predators of their food chain and advances in technology

13

Harvey, Graham. Animism: Respecting the Living World. C Hurst & Co Publishers Ltd, 2005.

and industrialisation have made fear of attack by other creatures, as well as fear of disease, increasingly remote concerns. Of course, the rate of this process varies significantly in different areas of the world. The idea of the Avatar Program in the film is to send biologically engineered Navi bodies, piloted remotely by humans, to live among the natives so that they can first learn their customs and language and become accepted by them, and then persuade them to relocate from their ancestral homeland. If they cant be persuaded to relocate, the human military is preparing to use force against them. The human desire for more and greater resources stands in stark contrast to the Navis delicately balanced coexistence with their ecosystem. The Navis lo-tech indigenous way of life is blissful in the rainforest landscape until they are disturbed by the industrialised forces of invasive humans. This process is reflected in the experiences of some 150 million tribal people living in more than 60 countries across the world including the Amazon, Southern Africa and Peru.14 Though it is extremely hard to comprehend the notion of humans living without contact with the outside world, aerial footage of uncontacted tribes on the BrazilPeruvian border was taken by Brazilian anthropologist Jose Carlo do Reis Meirelles, in February 2011.15 The footage was also featured on BBCs Human Planet program. because of the threat posed by illegal logging and mining, he believes that the fight to protect these people depends on proving and publicising their existence. This aerial footage was shot from 1km away using a stabilised zoom lens.16 With this evidence of uncontacted tribes, a subsequent letter from the Peruvian government recognised the situation of the peoples living in isolation and/or initial contact and promised, for the first time, that five new reserves for indigenous communities were in the pipeline. Survival International, a non-governmental organisation that is campaigning for the tribe's protection, reported that Wealthy landowners in Paraguay have been caught red-handed after newly-released satellite images showed their startling destruction of almost 4,000 hectares of forest which is inhabited by uncontacted Indians.17 Wave of child deaths struck indigenous communities in Venezuela on 22 April 2011.18
14

Survival International. (2011). Tribes and campaigns. [online] Available from: http://www.survivalinternational.org/tribes [Assessed: 2nd May 2011] 15 Docx, Edward. (2011). The last stand of the Amazon. The Guardian. 3 April. Available from http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/apr/03/last-stand-of-the-amazon [Assessed: 22th April 2011] 16 ibid
17 18

Anon. (2011). Ranchers caught red-handed from Space. Survival International. 11 April. Available from http://www.survivalinternational.org/news/7187 [Assessed: 22 April 2011] Anon. (2011). Wave of child deaths strikes indigenous community in Venezuela. Survival International. 22 April. Available from: http://www.survivalinternational.org/news/7243 [Assessed: 22 April 2011]

10

Fig.12: Navi habitants.

New age ecological philosophy

How does Avatar compare to new age ecological philosophy? In one particular scene in the film, the Navi are shown conducting a healing ceremony at the foot of the Tree of souls (see Fig. 13). They gather at the tree, with their bodies connected with one another and with the ground, forming a neural system that can heal with help from the spirit of Ewya. The presence of energy and the Eywa entity is highlighted with the use of light in the scenes. Remarkably, the scenes featuring group prayer around the Tree of Souls bears a striking resemblance to the 'Monkey Chant' practiced in Bali, which is a modern adaptation of the older sanghyang ritual, in which participates induce trance through dance, inviting entities to temporarily possess their bodies in hopes of warding off evil. 19

19

Griebel, Thaddeus. (2011). The Inverted Spirituality of Avatar: Elevating Collective Consciousness to the Level of

Divinit. [Online] 26 May 2011. Available from: www.mindclouded.blogspot.com http://mindunclouded.blogspot.com/2010/05/inverted-spirituality-of-avatar.html [Assessed: 22 April 2011]

11

Fig. 13: Ceremony at the tree of souls

Figure 14 Balinese Monkey Chant

12

The Navis spiritual connecting with Eywa implies a holistic worldview and deep ecological awareness with regards to Pandoras biosphere. Holism is a belief that interprets the world as an integrated whole rather than a dissociated collection of parts reference. Deep ecological awareness is spiritual or religious awareness. When the concept of human spirits is understood as a mode of consciousness in which the individual feels a sense of belonging, of connectedness, to the cosmos as a whole, it becomes clear that ecological awareness is spiritual in its deepest essence. It is, therefore, not surprising that the emerging new vision of reality based on deep ecological awareness is so-called perennial philosophy of spiritual traditions, according to Capra. This awareness is shared by some groups in our society, including Christian mystics and Buddhists and in the philosophy of Native American tribes.20

This form of holistic and ecological understanding is a hypothesis shared by many scientists, such as James Lovelock. Working alone since the age of 40, he invented a device that detected CFCs, which helped detect the growing hole in the ozone layer, and introduced the Gaia hypothesis, a revolutionary theory that the Earth is a self-regulating super-organism. Initially ridiculed by many scientists as new age nonsense, today that theory forms the basis of almost all climate science.21 In The ages of Gaia, Lovelock explains that his Gaia hypothetic is an extension of Charles Darwins theory of evolution and ecosystems as a tangled bank The Gaia Theory posits that the organic and inorganic components of Planet Earth have evolved together as a single living, self-regulating system. It suggests that this living system has automatically controlled global temperature, atmospheric content, ocean salinity, and other factors, that maintains its own habitability. In a phrase, life maintains conditions suitable for its own survival.22
20 21

Capra, Fritjof. The web of life: a new synthesis of mind and matter. London: HarperCollins, 1996. p.7 Aitkenhead, Decca. (2008). Enjoy life while you can. The Guardian. 1 March. Available from:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/2008/mar/01/scienceofclimatechange.climatechange [Assessed: 22 April 2011]

22

The Gaia Theory. (2010). Understanding gaia theory. [Online] Available from

http://www.gaiatheory.org/synopsis.htm [Assessed: 22 April 2011]

13

The theory views the earth as one living organism, with the sea, the atmosphere, the wind etc. all components of this system. Through its presentation of Pandora and Eywa, the message of Avatar seems to be that Earth represents a similarly centralised organism. The Navi demonstrates a lotech way of life that achieves balance with such a system, through self-sufficiency and self-regulation. This style of living adheres to the views expressed by scientists such as Capra and Lovelock. In Avatar, the varying natural environments of Pandora are seen as part of a global system. In Blade Runner, a similar, though significantly less blissful, sense of global unity has been achieved through a global system of information technology, corporate influence and surveillance. Both Blade Runner and Avatar describe environments that are a global united system - one is technological and the other is ecological.

New ideas of sustainable development

In Avatar avaricious corporate figure Park Selfridges intention is to force the native Navi off Pandora, in order to obtain precious ore scattered on their rich landscape to resolve the energy crisis on Earth, after human beings looted all their resources on their own planet. With the Navi in fear of the military taking over their land, the storyline then leads us to a final epic war between modern technology-versusancient bows and arrows weaponry 23 (See Fig. 15).

23

Borpujari, Utpal. (2010). Avatars important message: Respect nature. [online] February 28 2010. Available from:

Deccan Herald.com http://www.deccanherald.com/content/42370/avatars-important-message-respect-nature.html [Assessed: 2nd May 2011]

14

Fig. 15: war between modern technology-versus-ancient bows and arrows weaponry

The conduct of military unit demonstrates the extremes of western behaviours, in particular, global corporations who exploitation natural resources for economic rewards, political power and hierarchy. This is an on going problem in our world, a recent article by Guardian reporter, Edward Docx, reported the current conditions of the Amazon. He first visited Peru in 2003 and he estimated that the amount of land that has been covered by oil and gas concessions has increased fivefold almost 50% of the entire Peruvian-owned Amazon. This means that the government has effectively sold off half of the rainforest it owns for the specific purpose of oil and gas extraction in return for taxes, bonuses, royalties. Every time there is oil exploration, there is major disruption and destruction to the forest, starting with seismic testing and following through with helicopters, roads, oil wells, crews and so on; each development brings a chaos of unplanned settlement and more deforestation. And inevitably, whenever oil is found there are catastrophic spills and accidents. A lawsuit is being brought to court by members of the indigenous Achuar tribe for contaminating the region.24 Capitalistic behaviour of taking over the entity for profit has caused damaging consequences because of the fail to accept environmental and human responsibilities.

24

Docx, Edward. (2011). The last stand of the Amazon. The Guardian. 3 April. Available from

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/apr/03/last-stand-of-the-amazon [Assessed: 22th April 2011]

15

In The web of life, Capra explains that environmental concerns have become a paramount importance because the irreversible harming of the biosphere and human life25. To build a sustainable community to satisfy our needs and chances of future generations, we need to reconnect with the web of life and learn valuable lessons from the study of ecosystems, which are sustainable communities of plants, animals, and micro-organisms. To understand these lessons, we need to learn the basic principles of ecologyto become ecologically literate Being ecologically literate, or ecoliterate, means understanding the principles of organisation of ecological communities and using those principles for creating sustainable human communities including our educational communities, business communities, and political communities- so that the principles of ecology become manifest in them as principles of education, management, and politics26 Navi species in Avatar consistently underscores the ideas to be respectful to and learn to live in harmony with nature, using its resources in a sustainable way, and without capitalist development leading to mass displacement, or other such hardships to people. Exploitation and being marginalised by the governments and multinational companies is an on going subject, we also see this is Blade Runner where replicates act as slaves to their creator. To an extent this is clearly a mockery of the role of us and our relationships with global corporations and governments.

Conclusion
Avatar demonstrates nature is a human concept and a formulation of a binary of nature and culture. The subject diversifies in other fundamental parts of other concepts including ecology, sustainability, concepts of matter, networks and systems, cybernetics, philosophy and histories. The films imaginary world and visual imagery makes it a product of mass appeal. Cameron obviously has used these devices to tell a story in a part reality, part fantasy, and part war epic movie. 27 Despite it being a science fiction film, the
25 26

Capra, Fritjof. The web of life: a new synthesis of mind and matter. London: HarperCollins, 1996. P. 3 Ibid., pg. 289

27

Borpujari, Utpal. (2010). Avatars important message: Respect nature. [online] February 28 2010. Available from: Deccan Herald.com http://www.deccanherald.com/content/42370/avatars-important-message-respect-nature.html [Assessed: 2nd May 2011]

16

foundation of the narrative ironically comes from precedents from our past and present. Avatar has shown us similarities between Navi natives and humans, not just morphologically but culturally, this includes holistic thinking, systematic thinking, and animalistic and spiritual religions. Navi natives have showed us a deep ecological awareness and the understanding of the environment as one united ecology system, thus provoking thoughts of environmental activism to protect nature and to build and nurture new ideas of sustainable development. Avatar and Blade Runner have both showed natural environments as a global network system. This is a concept that has been put forward by certain religions, tribal societies, and system thinkers such as Marshall McLuhan, James Lovelock and Fritjof Capra. Both films foresee a dystopia future with the domination of global corporations and technologies in cities and in natural environments, this is a prediction that is already true in the Amazon and the problems they are currently under.

Bibliography
Films and videos

Cameron, James. (2009). Avatar: Director's Cut. 20th Century Fox Gray, John: (2009). The myths of animism and religion have retreated, only to resurface through the channel of science. The Guardian.

Books

Scott, Ridley. (1982). Blade Runner: Director's Cut [DVD]. Warner Brothers.

Capra, Fritjof. The web of life: a new synthesis of mind and matter. London: Harper Collins, 1996.

17

Forty, Adrian. 'Nature' in Words and Buildings: A Vocabulary of Modern Architecture. London: Thames & Hudson, 2004. pp. 220-239. Harvey, Graham. Animism: Respecting the Living World. C Hurst & Co Publishers Ltd, 2005. Lovelock, James. Ages of Gaia. Oxford University Press, 1995. Lovelock, James. Gaia: A New Look at Life on Earth. 3rd edition. Oxford University Press, 2000.

Journals

Abrams, Janet. (Sept 1982). Slicing into the future: Ridley Scott's new film 'Blade Runner' makes some interesting speculations about 21st century architecture. Building design. no. 611. 24, p. 16-17.

Linn, Charles. (Oct 1994). 'Blade Runner' still on the cutting edge, familiar as it is. Architectural Record. vol. 182, no. 10. Oct., p. 27. Meades. Jonathan. (Sept 1982). Future retrospective: Ridley Scott's latest fantasy film 'Blade Runner' is essential viewing for all architectural postmodernists. Architects Journal. vol. 176, no. 38, , p. 28-29.

Toy, Maggie and others. (Nov/Dec 1994). AD Profile 112. Architecture & film. Architectural Design. no. 11/12 (64), p. 6-96.

News articles.

Aitkenhead, Decca. (2008). Enjoy life while you can. The Guardian. 1 March.

Available from: http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/2008/mar/01/scienceofclimatechange.climatechang e [Assessed: 22 April 2011]

Docx, Edward. (2011). The last stand of the Amazon. The Guardian. 3 April. Available from http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/apr/03/last-standof-the-amazon [Assessed: 22th April 2011]

18

Anon. (2011). Ranchers caught red-handed from Space. Survival International. 11 April. Available from http://www.survivalinternational.org/news/7187 [Assessed: 22 April 2011]

Anon. (2011). Wave of child deaths strikes indigenous community in Venezuela.

Survival International. 22 April. Available from: http://www.survivalinternational.org/news/7243 [Assessed: 22 April 2011] Websites

Borpujari, Utpal. (2010). Avatars important message: Respect nature. [online] February 28 2010. Available from: Deccan Herald.com http://www.deccanherald.com/content/42370/avatars-important-messagerespect-nature.html [Assessed: 2nd May 2011]

BBC News. (2010). China renames 'Avatar' mountain in honour of film. [online] Available from: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asiapacific/8480954.stm [Assessed: 2nd May 2011]

Dick, Philip K. (n.d). Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?. Philip K. Dick. [online]. Available from: http://www.philipkdick.com [Assessed: 22th April 2011]

Graeme, Roy. (n.d). Plot Summary for Blade Runner. The IMDb Movies Database. [online]. Available from: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0083658/plotsummary [Assessed: 2nd May 2011]

Griebel, Thaddeus. (2011). The Inverted Spirituality of Avatar: Elevating Collective Consciousness to the Level of Divinit. [Online] 26 May 2011. Available from: www.mindclouded.blogspot.com http://mindunclouded.blogspot.com/2010/05/inverted-spirituality-of-avatar.html [Assessed: 22 April 2011]

Anon. (n.d). The real science of Avatar. TIME Magazine. Available from http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1983917_2128761,00.html [Assessed:2nd May 2011]

The Gaia Theory. (2010). Understanding gaia theory. [Online] Available from http://www.gaiatheory.org/synopsis.htm [Assessed: 22 April 2011]

Survival International. (2011). Tribes and campaigns. [online] Available from: http://www.survivalinternational.org/tribes [Assessed: 2nd May 2011]

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Image Index Fig.1 Screenshot from Scott, Ridley. (1982). Blade Runner: Director's Cut [DVD]. Warner Brothers. Fig. 2 Screenshot from Cameron, James. (2009). Avatar: Director's Cut. 20th Century Fox Fig. 3 Anon. 2010. Real avatar floating mountain. [online]. Aftabs blog. Available on http://aftabaftab.blogspot.com/2010/02/real-avatar-floatingmountain.html . [Assessed: 22 April 2011] Fig. 4 Screenshot from Cameron, James. (2009). Avatar: Director's Cut. 20th Century Fox Fig. 5 Schulueter, Jen. 2007. To go with AFP story by martine. [online]. Available on Getty images. http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/87807014/DDP [Assessed: 22 April 2011] Fig. 6 Screenshot from Cameron, James. (2009). Avatar: Director's Cut. 20th Century Fox Fig. 7 Nachoum, Amos. 1980. Christmas Tree Worm with Spiral Gills. [online].Available on CORBIS Images. www.corbisimages.com/Enlargement/Enlargement.aspx? id=UM001917&tab=details&caller=search [Assessed: 22 April 2011] Fig. 8 Screenshot from Cameron, James. (2009). Avatar: Director's Cut. 20th Century Fox Fig. 9 Horrocks, Roger. n.d. Ponta Da Mamoli, Southern Mozambique, Africa. [online]. Available on Getty images. http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/74732658/Gallo-Images [Assessed: 22 April 2011] Fig. 10 Screenshot from Cameron, James. (2009). Avatar: Director's Cut. 20th Century Fox Fig. 11 Scolding, Neal. n.d. Brain cells. Fluorescence light micrograph of assorted brain cells. [online]. Available on Photo Researchers.

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http://db2.photoresearchers.com/search? key=Rat+Dendrites&vid=none&lcn=rf&submit=search&lcn=rm&countr y=USA [Assessed: 22 April 2011] Fig. 12 Screenshot from Cameron, James. (2009). Avatar: Director's Cut. 20th Century Fox Fig. 13 Screenshot from Cameron, James. (2009). Avatar: Director's Cut. 20th Century Fox Fig. 14 anon. n.d. Balinese Monkey Chant. [Online] Available on http://mindunclouded.blogspot.com/2010/05/inverted-spirituality-ofavatar.html [Assessed: 22 April 2011] Fig.15 Screenshot from Cameron, James. (2009). Avatar: Director's Cut. 20th Century Fox

21