John Barth wrote in the novella Chimera, his ode to storytelling, that the key to the treasure is the treasure. As a writer, like all writers, he appeared to be obsessed with the idea of originality. Barth has a keen love of One Thousand and One Nights (or Arabian Nights) in which a woman must tell hundreds of engaging stories to a brutal king to save her own skin from execution. In light of the fact that almost every kind of story has been told before, Barth’s answer to originality is not in the originality of the story, but rather in the originality of the telling. Chimera does just that: Barth retells the frame stories (stories about telling stories) of a few mythological beings, often writing himself into the story, and ultimately coming to that conclusion.

It’s been said that there are basically two plot outlines: someone goes on a trip, or a stranger comes to town. This probably accounts for every Stephen King novel in existence, and mostly every Hollywood movie you’ve ever seen. Charlie Kaufman in Adaptation, no doubt a screenwriter influenced by Barth, had this problem when adapting a novel for the screen. His attempts at creating an engaging story without sacrificing originality were in vain. His answer, like Barth’s, was one in the same: tell the same story in a new way.

James Cameron doesn’t seem to have this problem, but his new film Avatar has received a lot of heat for its lack of originality. It does include the two major plot outlines I’ve described before, and is often compared to Dances with Wolves and the story of Pocahontas—both of which aren’t exactly original ideas either. But what Cameron does is tell his story in a new way, which includes relevant pieces of pop culture, environmental theory, and political implications. The mixture here is original to Cameron, and for that, the accusations are mostly baseless, and thankfully so for more than a few aspiring screenwriters who aren’t exactly inventing new and exciting plot lines.

It’s not even apparent if people really want originality. The box office, I’m afraid, mostly comprises of boy meets girl fare. There is always a formula (or as cleverly described in Adaptation: principles.) People seem to rely on it to anchor themselves to a plot, regardless of how uniquely it is told. Quentin Tarantino gets this critique with every film release: he’s a hack, he’s not original, he just remakes things. Of course, Tarantino would probably admit to the fact, but what is lost on his critics is how he tells the story, rather than creates the story. Can we really expect any director, or writer for that matter, to be original?

Michael Haneke, on the other hand, could care less. His films are probably some of the most loved and most hated of modern cinema. (re: Code Unknown, Cache, The White Ribbon.) One reason? They can be unbearably depressing. But more profoundly, they almost never contain a resolution. This can be rather frustrating for your typical (intro, plot, climax, resolution) movie-goer, who expects answers, like a dog expects a reward after rolling over in glee.

Charlie Kaufman self-consciously struggled with this concept in Adaptation, but Haneke does so without flinching. His films create scenarios, introduce puzzles, and leave you cold as you scramble for a solution. If Barth supposes that the key to the treasure is the treasure, then Haneke says: The mystery has no answer. The mystery is the answer.

What is the meaning of life? What am I meant to do? Is there a God? What happens when I die? Oh, and by the way, who was really responsible for 9/11?

Thomas Pynchon, a postmodern writer like Barth, often wrote about our needs for answers, no matter how silly those answers may arrive. In The Crying of Lot 49, a character stumbles across a conspiracy involving the postal service and the infamous W.A.S.T.E., but is never sure if the conspiracy is real, a hoax, or just a string of paranoid coincidences. Our need for answers is so ingrained in our finite minds that we are willing to spill blood to defend what is little other than a micro-cultural brand of our choosing.

Answers are the things we create because we are afraid of the mysteries. A thousand cults are born for one thousand answers, and originality and truth are sacrificial.

Back to Cameron’s Avatar. He presupposes a world where everything is interconnected and linked through ecology, biology, and sociology. There is no doubt that Pandora mirrors our own, and seeks to remind us that humanity doesn’t exist in some shielded bubble, unaffected by the environment.

Cameron’s answer: Our existence is endangered by all things that serve to separate us from others: race, creed, religion, economics, evolution. But you—of course—have another answer to that mystery, and a thousand others—flickering, guiding.