INASCIFI BLOG

This is a poster for Avatar. The poster art copyright is believed to belong to the distributor of the film, 20th Century Fox, the publisher of the film or the graphic artist.

Avatar (2009) is written and directed by James Cameron, starring Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Sigourney Weaver, Stephen Lang and Giovanni Ribisi.

The year is 2154 and paraplegic ex-marine Jake Sully is sent to a distant planet called Pandora, on a mission initially meant for his dead twin brother. The rich and lush Pandora is inhabited by locals named Na’vi–a humanoid race of yellow-eyed, blue-skinned beings, each about 2.7m to 3.7m tall. Jake is to drive what is called an Avatar, which is a human-made Na’vi lookalike that is connected and controlled by a person’s mind while the person is kept safe somewhere else. What is once thought as a harmless mission of getting to know Pandora and the Na’vis turns complicated as the humans are willing to do whatever it takes to mine the planet’s rich mineral which is greatly valuable on Earth.

When people hear Avatar, they think “special effects”. And they are right, since Avatar flaunts an impressive, groundbreaking CGI work. Everything looks so surreal yet believable, out-of-this-world yet convincing. You might be skeptic about blue aliens being believable but when you see those aliens move, speak in their language, express their emotions, you’ll be immersed in the world. You will believe. Neytiri has yellow eyes, blue skin, a tail and is inhumanly tall, but damn she IS pretty. She IS sexy. The Na’vi culture and language feel so real that it seems like they really do exist. The abundant and luscious Pandora and the Na’vis feel like a version of Earth that we often dream of–green, untouched, harmonious. Who isn’t awed when seeing Pandora in night for the first time? With its glow-in-the-dark plants and wondrous animals? The stunning visual effects never fail to draw you in.

There is no denying that the plot is not as impressive as the special effects. When you’ve seen the 3-minute trailer, you’ve practically found out the plot of the whole movie. The characters develop like you think they will develop, no surprising plot twists whatsoever. But that does not matter at all. You are already engaged in Pandora, captivated by its beauty, charmed by the characters. The fact that the plot is so-so does not matter at all because Avatar gives you a movie experience that you don’t often get. That kind of movie experience that The Lord of the Rings trilogy gave you. Something mind-blowing, something awe-inspiring, an experience you’ll remember forever. Avatar reminds us why we go to the movies. Avatar shows us what 3D is for. For almost three hours Avatar never fails to keep us interested, keep us in awe. This is a movie to remember, an experience you’ll never forget.

Greetings!

After some considerations with my Indonesian friends, it has been decided that Inascifi.com will stay online for the moment. As we’re finishing the first quarter of 2010, a plethora of science fiction productions have appear. Of course, one of 2009’s production that’s bringing a lot of media attention is James Cameron’s Avatar.

I can tell for the first two months in Indonesia, Avatar was in the top ten box office list in Blitz Megaplex.

How related this is to science fiction fandom in Indonesia remains to be seen, but for now we have our first review of Avatar from Naomi Lie.

Once again, enjoy reading through Inascifi. We hope to bring more content online!

Hello everyone. It’s Arvin here. Some of you may know me, others may only know me through online. For years there’s been this group called Inascifi, an Indonesian science fiction group. Inascifi has a blog and a website at inascifi.com. But for quite some time, there hasn’t been any worthwhile activity nor any participation from the group members, and thus I’m considering of terminating it because of financial reasons. What do you think?

Please post your answers at:

http://www.facebook.com/topic.php?topic=13973&uid=46777425774

or post your comments below.
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Halo semuanya, Arvin nih. Sebagian dari anda mungkin sudah mengenal saya, sebagian lain hanya kenal secara online. Selama bertahun-tahun ada sebuah grup yang disebut Inascifi. Grup ini awalnya kumpulan penggemar fiksi ilmiah yang kebetulan ditemukan saya. Grup ini juga memiliki blog dan website di inascifi.com. Tapi karena sudah lama tidak ada aktivitas ataupun partisipasi dari anggota grup tersebut, saya sedang memikirkan untuk mematikannya karena alasan finansial. Bagaimana pendapat anda?

Harap dijawab di:

http://www.facebook.com/topic.php?topic=13973&uid=46777425774

atau beri komentar di bawah.

Hi all!

Before I start getting into reviews, info or any other topics related to science fiction, let me first apologize for the lack of updates in this blog for the past few months.

Anyway, I’m happy to report about my recent experience attending a local Indonesian fan community celebrating their 6th Anniversary. Yes, The Indonesian Star Trek Community has turned six years old this year, and 2009 has been a very wonderful year for them. Aside the new movie that came out last May (or June in Indonesia), the community have received lots of support (including from PT Indosat, one of Indonesia’s local telecommunications provider) and had a wonderful birthday party at Pisa Kafe Mahakam (near Blok M, Jakarta Selatan).

I wish I could post pictures and stuff like that, but unfortunately my camera never left my bag. Well, I’ll post some pics from the Indo Star Trek’s facebook page.

Qa’pla! (Success in Klingonese)

Hi, I know it’s been awhile since I’ve written anything significant here in this blog. Things been going on in my personal life, but I promise to post some newer reviews and perhaps new previews related to science fiction. Regards…

Hi, I know it’s been awhile since I’ve written anything significant here in this blog. Things been going on in my personal life, but I promise to post some newer reviews and perhaps new previews related to science fiction. Regards…

Inascifi’s creation was based on the founder (I myself) frustration toward the Indonesian paradigm and view toward the science fiction genre.

I myself felt benefit by the genre in many aspects.

Reading the novel Starship Troopers (by Robert A. Heinlein) helped me understand civics, the nature of human spirit and violent tendency, and the necessity to sacrifice one’s own self for the benefit of others.

The Star Trek franchise gave me a good idea what a brighter and better future would be for mankind once we eliminate poverty and starvation through economic abundance.

The Star Wars saga gave a good story regarding good vs evil and the power of love and redemption.

The Bicentennial Man (based on the novella of the same title written by Isaac Asimov) helped me realize the value of human life, the simple biological processes we experience daily that we’ve often take for granted. The film also conveyed a wonderful message of love between a man and woman, though certain religious folks will find the concept very offensive.

The Stargate franchise, provoked the idea what if aliens who are so technological advanced came down to Earth in 6,000 BC and enslaved the human race. With their advanced technology, they build the Pyramids as their ships’ landing sites, and put themselves as gods upon the primitive humanity.

Quantum Leap, has a story of an altruistic scientist who want to do good in a world so filled with tears and sadness, and through time travel he disguised himself as an ordinary person who happen to be at the right place and right time, and changed history to the better and touch many lives in the process.

These stories… are quite complex and requires a good deal of intelligence to understand, and apparently not many Indonesians seem to appreciate this. Perhaps they do, but just never found the right channel to access news and information regarding ’science fiction’.

In the beginning,

there was ina_sci-fi.

Like many small electronic groups that formed in the virtual world, the community grew and shrank, and almost collapsed.

Then, the founder came up with the idea to shorten the name, to Inascifi.

The idea was to reduced the task of typing underscores ( _ ) and dashes ( – ) signs each time he sent an email to the group, and it worked.

The suddenly! Without warning, the founder’s father found himself being billed a good amount of American Dollars on his credit card. The founder bought the domain, inascifi.com .

It was a blessing in disguised. The Yahoo! provider allowed inascifi.com become a small business website, with many tools and emails and bandwidth space. But the main issue was not with the tools.

It was the tool user. He need time and concentration a large amount of fun in developing the website and community. Added with the burden as a research executive in a marketing research company, reduced his free time and creativity.

The science fiction community’s future was threaten.

< to be continued >

GUYS…

Indonesian Star Trek Community

these Indonesian Star Trek fellows are impressive.

This year they had a gathering in Bandung, another gathering in Jakarta, and many other gatherings before that.

Still, as much I am a Trekker, I still love Star Wars, Battlestar Galactica, Firefly and other science fiction related literature/media.

I know there are two Star Wars groups in Indonesia (one dedicated to Jedi, the other to the Sith).

Where are they now?

We’re happy to say that something will happen soon.

Stay in touch!