It’s the Avatar: Fire and Ash scene critics and fans keep talking about: A sensual, druggy, S&M-tinged meeting between the film’s two big villains: Col. Miles Quaritch (Stephen Lang) and Ash People witch-queen Varang (Oona Chaplin). https://t.co/k3lgSIMqGc
— The Hollywood Reporter (@THR) December 21, 2025
Mild spoilers
James Cameron talked about an infamous scene in the latest Avatar film between the two villains Quaritch and Varang.
Quaritch proposes an alliance with her clan and Varang makes him consume a hallucinogen before seductively cutting his chest with a knife.
Says Cameron, “It’s a double seduction. He’s there to get her to do what he wants her to do, then it seems like she’s got him under her thumb, and yet the whole time he’s had a plan and it actually works.”
This was the scene that Oona Chaplin auditioned with and she beat out three famous actresses for the role. “There’s a sexuality, there’s a dominating psychology, and there’s a lot of fury,” Cameron said of Chaplin’s audition. “There are a lot of layers to what she’s doing there and the forces that are driving her, and Oona was able to move fluidly back and forth between those in a way that I wasn’t seeing with the others.“
