When Titanic came out in in 1997 people oohed and ahhed at the dazzling special effects and the nearly perpendicular death falls of passengers, this was a huge epic love story pasted on the background of a huge dizzying set and for a while the audience was transported much like an extended Disneyland ride into a world outside of themselves and away from their current lives. Today in 2010, America and now the world are again enthralled in another visual entertainment ride transported far away for a couple of hours away from the terrible worries and anxieties of reality by the dazzling special effects and another love story and American-based fairytale in outerspace. Nevertheless, both Titanic and Avatar are just that - amazing visual entertainment rides that allow us to turn off our minds and absorb the visual images and forget our real world for a few moments, hope for a better future with images of perhaps experiencing some moral uplift in ourselves. Whether or not the audience afterwards has really been intellectually stimulated with a truly layered and qualitatively substantive script with any depth is another matter. Yes, both Titanic and Avatar were phemonena but so were the Wall Street Crash and executive bonuses, UFO Balloon ride, and the Palin Vice Presidential campaign, and the death of Princess Diana or the television coverage of OJ Simpson's trial.
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