James Cameron has been creating a lot of buzz for his upcoming movie Avatar by touting how original and revolutionary the film will be. But is the “revolutionary” film that has taken Cameron ten years to create just a rip-off of a 1957 science fiction novel?
Cameron is no stranger to controversy over plagiarism in films. After being sued by Harlan Ellison (writer for the Outer Limits) for Ellison’s idea’s being used in The Terminator, Cameron was forced to acknowledge Ellison in the credits.
Poul Anderson’s Call Me Joe is a science fiction novel written in 1957 which focuses on a paraplegic main character — Ed Anglesey — who has a telepathic connection with an artificially created life-form which leads to him no longer wanting to be human. Cameron’s Avatar is centered around main character — Jake Sully — also a paraplegic who loses his connection with the human race after using his newly created artificial body. Even the artwork on the cover of Call Me Joe looks similar to the spear-wielding striped blue aliens in Avatar.
While Cameron has cited sources such as Dances with Wolves, Rudyard Kipling and Edgar Rice Burroughs as influences for Avatar, it’s very strange that he has not made any mention of Call Me Joe.
James Cameron's Avatar
Poul Anderson's Call Me Joe
November 1, 2009
#1
While possible that he could have read this as a kid and forgot about it or is even well aware of it; there are an infinite number of variations of science fiction stories. Of course something will resemble something else. You are bound to run into a story of a paraplegic and a blue alien race.
Personally I think he was inspired by it and probably read it as a kid and forgot that it wasn’t all a dream but something he stored in his subconscious for later.
November 12, 2009
#2
Xen, the term for this is Cryptomnesia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptomnesia). Given when the original work came out, it’s entirely plausible for such a scenario to be valid.
November 12, 2009
#3
Sorry for the double post, but I thought it only appropriate to include that the concept of Crytomnesia is highly debated and while I personally believe in it (then again, I’m the kind of person who believes there are no truly “original” ideas and everyone’s copying off everyone else to some extent), there are many who do not. By some respects, it could be just as likely that this movie is a rip-off as it is for this all to be a complete coincidence.
Again, sorry for the double post.
November 12, 2009
#4
“Flash of lightning Elaine I just realized why I like this cartoon so much. It’s a Ziggy! That irreverence , that wit I’d recognize it anywhere. Some charlatan has stolen a Ziggy and passed it off as his own. I can prove it. Quick Elaine , to my archives.” -J Peterman
November 13, 2009
#5
Yes, Cryptomnesia is real and everything is just regurgitation just in different ways. Like how we are products of our mother and father. It’s all the same features but taken from different bases to create a new mix that’s a lot like the two bases it is ripped from but unique in its own mixture. Just look at how we talk. All from our observation of it being used before. Just words switched around to call our own.
November 14, 2009
#6
I agree, but Cameron could have at least made an effort to make his “revolutionary” characters a little more different than just subtracting two legs.
December 21, 2009
#7
I just saw the film and it is exactly the same as the book. He even gets the female(s) at the end!
January 19, 2010
#8
lol, doesn’t the hero always get the girl in the end? ^_^