Jake [self-centered westerner] meets Neytiri [sexy, nature-loving savage].

The scene that I feel is totally loaded -- & therefore truly demands the most analytical attention from me ---- is the slaying of the ‘wolf-pack’ in order to save Jake. Although we briefly hit on it in class, I believe these first insights to Neytiri and Jake – lay out the entirety of the characters, their upbringings, and cultures. I felt I could dig in further. Here’s why:

After his curiosity / bad judgment left him stranded in the deadly jungle at night [typical city kid in the outdoors for the first time]…. Jake is wandering aimlessly. Lost. Making noise. Drawing attention to himself with a torch. Therefore, [it comes of no surprise] that Jake is attacked by a pack of dark, vicious, wolf-like creatures & ends up defenseless and at the verge of death. Neytiri [beautiful, naked, toned woman with dreads] leaps to the rescue. [Literally. Straddling the camera during the leap. In slow motion, of course.] She saves Jake’s life by killing a few of the creatures and scaring off the others with her stick and [slightly sexy] ‘growl.’

After this battle plays out -- the scene unfolds to where Neytiri kneels on the neck of the animal she had wounded with an arrow [no technology]. She then whispers a prayer & stabs the dark wolf in its jugular [a sign she is very accustomed to death and killing]. She stands, walks [gracefully] around the animal - kneels on the opposite side –places her hands on its back and head. She is calm. Beautiful. She is sorrowful, respectful, and mourning her duty, but respecting this animal enough to let it free. She is raw and animalistic, yet smooth and calm in her movements. Then, with these ‘cultural readings’ sinking in, she viciously yanks the arrow out of the animal. [Ensuring we know she is bad-ass, killer-worthy, untrustable as well.]

As she performs these death rituals – Jake [white, self-centered, city boy] is absolutely oblivious to the sanctity. The prayer offerings. The spiritual aspects of the scene. He is one hundred percent self-focused. He has absolutely no regard for any consequences or lives that were taken in the battle. [Heck, the thought didn’t even cross his mind that others were killed in the battle.] His only thought – is that he is alive. It matters not – well… anything else.

So Jake – doesn’t even see that Neytiri is busy/honoring/praying. So he interrupts. [Cuz his words are always most important.] & so he fumbles through a cheesy, “You probably cannot understand me, but thank you,” – directed at Neytiri.

She doesn’t respond – so he sees her, now even more-so, as a savage, uneducated, even stupid being. He sees HER, actually, as inconsiderate. For not answering. Regardless of what she just did for him – or what she is doing now. So he changes his tone, so now it is a bit more degrading. He is obviously looking down on her – and demands that she acknowledges his apology. She still says nothing – so he brings out a line, a compliment. Nothing. He even laughs and makes a joke about how he would have “been screwed” if she hadn’t come to save him.

Jake – represents a pompous, self-centered, egotistical white American city boy. He is wobbly in his movements. He is a business man – saying what he ‘should’ – the thank yous when he is supposed to, even though she ‘probably cannot understand’. He sees STATUS, more-so, that HIS is above hers. He is blunt. Rude. Unaware of his place within nature or his surroundings.

Neytiri -- represents this strong, genuine, native, beautiful, bold, sexy woman. She is very in tune to nature & her surroundings. She is every western man's fantasy. She is agile and moves both on two legs, and sometimes on all fours. She kills with a bow, stabs and slashes with a knife and stick, and even growls as her prey cower into the jungle. She is power. And grace. And sex. She is animalistic and a savage. She is no business woman. She sees no status. She has no recognition or embarrassment that she is not clothed and Jake is. No concept of that. And she states her feelings: bold and truthfully, never saying something just because she ‘should.’

Despite the sexual throws and fantasies unveiled -- I feel that those just support and allow us to follow up to the main focus of the scene: status and awareness.

Jake thinks HIS WESTERN CULTURE WAYS ARE BEST – and can SEE or HEAR no different—even amidst weakness – he cannot be open to the fact that he might be wrong, intruding, or the undereducated. Neytiri -- shows him what is good. What is right. SAVES his life. But after she doesn't answer him -- he immediately places himself as above her and looks to his culture, rather than surroundings, to act from.

She looks around for what is right. What is sacred.

He thinks the world is his. To rule. To own. To demand how it works.