Speaking to Empire down the transatlantic hot-line, Zoe Saldaña is in crisis mode. “Let me let me find a place to go to where my kids are not going to be farting,” she laughs. Being a mother of three boys has been good training to play the latest incarnation of legendary Na’vi queen Neytiri in Avatar: The Way Of Water. Now, 14 years after the events of the original, Neytiri is married to Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) and raising a family in the crucible of conflict that is the ongoing battle against the RDA — it would seem that taking down Colonel Quaritch with a bow and arrow is a stroll in the park compared to bringing up four kids. Having found a safe haven from her trumping children, Saldaña is perceptive, funny company, be it talking about the uncanny real world parallels in the new film, the lack of respect dished out to Performance Capture as a form, and why James Cameron isn’t a genius.
EMPIRE: If we can go back to shooting the first movie, do you remember Jim talking about sequels back then?
Zoe Saldaña: Oh my gosh, yeah. He was very vocal from the beginning on where he felt he was going to take the story after the first journey. It felt wonderfulm because you just felt, “Oh my God, we're literally a part of somebody that is not just a one-time thing. But there was a huge possibility we wouldn't come back to this and I thought that was fine. It was 2006, 2007. I had never done a single sequel. Just the thought of being in my first sequel was thrilling.
What is the state of play at the start of The Way Of Water?
It's very much about love in the time of war, family in the time of war, growth in the time of war, all things in a time of war. Obviously, it's going to present challenges differently for Jake and Neytiri. I’m not saying its going to bring a strain into their marriage but it's going to be tested for sure. They are going be tested to the core in terms of their capabilities for love. Especially for Neytiri. She isn’t an avatar, she is solely a Na’vi, an Omaticaya, and she's never left the Pandoran forests. So the question is, does love stand the test of time and war? I feel like those are the questions that Jim will have for us throughout the whole story.
The family is forced to flee to the atolls of Pandora and find sanctity with the water-friendly Metkayina tribe. How would you describe that situation?
The Sullys’ relationship with the Metkayina will be very special. It will not be easy from the beginning, but it will be very relatable to how we see foreign policy. Nations are currently at war, and a big nation is being requested to take in refugees. They're gonna do it, but they're not going to be happy. It's going to be relatable in that sense. This whole situation that's happening with Russia and Ukraine, and how all of us allies of NATO just feel like we have to stand by, but it's just really difficult to take any more of a bigger role in this whole situation. I really feel the Metkayina are no different. They're kind of going; who are these people? Why the fuck? Can they make it work anywhere else? And what do we stand to lose If we let them in? They are right to be feeling everything they are feeling. It is going to be an uncomfortable situation.
It’s amazing that you shot the film in 2017 and this scenario is playing out in the world right now. That’s kind of nuts, isn't it?
Yeah, it's crazy. The first Avatar came out in 2009, before we really started to have a global conversation about climate change and it happened just a couple of years after. So, I think that Jim has always been ahead of the curve, but the reality is that it doesn't make him a genius. It just makes him a person that it is hugely sensitive to the world. He really feels responsible for educating himself on all kinds of situations that are going on in the world. If we all did that, I think we would all have the gift of foresight.
James Cameron is like your partner in crime. He's your enabler.
Jim also had the vision to cast Sigourney Weaver as your adoptive teenage daughter!
It’s a dream come true [pauses]… It’s not even a dream come true. I would have never dreamt in my wildest dreams thought I would be playing some kind of maternal figure in any role that Sigourney Weaver would have been playing, and yet James Cameron provided us the setting and the technology and the story for us to be able to to stretch that far. It was exhilarating. To see a master like Sigourney Weaver morph back into a child-like form. It's quite amazing. Very inspiring.
You also get to butt heads with Kate Winslet. How was that?
Oh, my God. I was like, ‘Too many dreams coming alive. I don’t think I can take it.’ Kate Winslet was a professional. I don't even know how to describe it. It would be like, “Roll camera” and she would hold her breath for seven minutes. She became this Metkayina. Omaticaya means ‘of the land’. The Metkayina tribe are ‘of water’. She immersed herself in all things Pandora. It almost felt like she had a little bit of FOMO when the first movie came out, and now that she and Jim were going to partner up again, she was going to run with it. We were trying to keep up.
What are your memories of shooting underwater?
It felt like out of body experiences. We are in a tank filled with water, and we're all going through these exercises that have been taught to us by world-renowned free divers. We're going to hold our breath for two to five minutes, and get an amazing scene. In theory, this all sounds really daunting. You're in the moment, you're in character, you've done all these exercises, your pupils are dilated, and Jim is like your partner in crime. He's your enabler. He's like, “Grab that machine and I'm going to catapult you from this distance to this distance. The moment I say action, watch your neck.” I’m like “Okay!” It's scary, but I honestly felt the calm from all the preparation and training.
The performance capture has been improved this time round. How did that feel?
Performance capture gives the actor the ability to still give his or herself. It's not animation. I feel like the industry's inability to adapt and evolve when it came to technology in film affected our first movie. I think the elite of this business have had a very, very cynical approach to genres of science fiction. And I feel like it's kept us from growing as an industry and making room for this genre, not just in awards, but also in critics’ minds. I’m talking about critics that are predominantly white males in their late 40s, early 50s, who tend to have a very limited capacity of a revolution – but that's okay. This happens not just in film. It happens in science, medicine, politics, education. It happens in families and it happens in the world. I hope that this time around, critics and people in powerful positions in the industry are able to assist audiences to understand just how magical and amazing this technology is, how truthful it is to a performance and to a filmmaker.
Finally, what do you think Jim loves about the world of Pandora?
I think that is a really charged question. I have a couple of answers. For me he just gets to blend in all the things in life and the world that have captured his heart, from his deep-sea diving to his excursions navigating to the far end of the world, from his knowledge of science and history, but also the operation of it all. I do believe he is a very sensible, sensitive individual who understands the importance of our place as a human race and knowing that anything that we do today, we will be facing those consequences in the future. He started out his career like that — just look at The Terminator. When we discover something and it makes us feel good, but give nothing back, what are the consequences of that kind of one-sided love that we have with this planet? So, I feel like Jim's conversation is always that, and Avatar gives him a world where he can have these conversations with us and also share with us what he considers beautiful in the world.
Avatar: The Way Of Water comes to UK cinemas from 16 December