A new lawsuit filed against film director James Cameron and the Walt Disney Company alleges that Cameron used the facial features of a then-14-year-old actress as the basis for one of the main characters in the film Avatar.
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The lawsuit, filed Tuesday by actress Qualianka Kircher, alleges that in 2005, when she was 14 years old, Cameron “extracted her facial features” from a photo of her portraying Pocahontas in the film “The New World” and “instructed the design team to use them as the basis for the character of Neytiri,” a release about the lawsuit said.
The complaint includes excerpts from interviews with Cameron and the production team that mention Kilcher by name and explain how her likeness was used as inspiration for the fictional character played on screen by Zoe Saldaña.
“This lawsuit exposes how one of Hollywood’s most influential filmmakers, through a series of intentional and inexpressive commercial practices, exploited the biometrics and cultural heritage of an indigenous girl to create a record-breaking film series without credit or compensation to her,” the complaint says. Kilcher is an indigenous Peruvian actress and activist.
According to the release, Kilcher’s likeness was captured in a production sketch, engraved onto a maquette, laser scanned into a high-resolution digital model, and distributed to multiple visual effects vendors to render Neytiri’s final look. That image, derived from Kilcher’s face, continued to appear in movies, movie posters, and merchandise without her knowledge or consent.
The complaint further alleges that Cameron and his team concealed the truth about the inspiration behind the character’s image for years.
“The result is a hugely profitable film series that pretends to be sympathetic to Indigenous struggles while silently exploiting real Indigenous youth behind the scenes,” the complaint states.
Prime Minister David Cameron used real human inspiration to create the Na’vi humanoid race depicted in the Avatar movie series. The series grossed billions of dollars across the trilogy, the lawsuit alleges. In 2005, Cameron was troubled by the appearance of his character, Neytiri, who seemed “too alien” to elicit sympathy from the audience.
The filmmakers then selected Kilcher’s image “as the source to form the basis of the humanoid design requirements as facial anchors,” the lawsuit says.
So when Kilcher’s image was published in the Los Angeles Times as part of promotion for The New World, Cameron “looked at the photo of 14-year-old Quarianka and knew he had found his muse,” the suit says, adding that Cameron himself admitted to using the image as the basis for the role.
Kilcher’s lips, chin, jawline, and overall mouth shape were preserved in Neytiri’s final image, and her use of facial features “literally transplanted a real teenager’s facial structure onto a blockbuster movie character,” according to the complaint.
The suit says Cameron and his team did not ask the girl’s permission or compensate her for the use of her image.
Kilcher didn’t know her face was being used until she met Cameron at an event in 2010, after the release of “Avatar.” At the event, Prime Minister Cameron told Kilcher that he had a gift for her in his office — a framed, one-off sketch of Neytiri that Cameron had drawn and signed, the suit said.
The gift included a handwritten note that read: “Your beauty was an early inspiration for Neytiri. Too bad you were making another movie. Next time.”
Still, the lawsuit alleges that the Avatar team made no attempt to cast Kilcher in the series, even after a talent agent at the time tried to get him in the door to read for the film.
“When I received Cameron’s sketch, I believed it to be a personal gesture and, at best, a loose inspiration tied to casting and my activities,” Kilcher said, according to the release.
“Millions of people believed in the message of Avatar and opened their hearts, and I was one of them. I never imagined that someone I trusted would systematically use my face as part of an elaborate design process and incorporate it into the production pipeline without my knowledge or consent. This crosses a huge line. This behavior is so wrong.”
According to the complaint, Kilcher first learned that Cameron had abused her facial features to such an extent late last year after a broadcast interview with her began making the rounds on social media. In the interview, Prime Minister Cameron is seen standing holding a sketch of Neytiri.
“The actual source of the information was a photo of a young actress named Qualianka Kilcher that appeared in the LA Times,” Cameron said in an interview, according to the complaint. “This is actually her… her lower face. She had a very interesting face.”
The complaint also suggests that Cameron’s use of Kilcher’s face violates California’s recently enacted deepfake pornography law, since the film uses the likeness of a minor to create a character who is later depicted in a scene with an intimate relationship.
“I am deeply disturbed to learn that my face, as a 14-year-old girl, was photographed and used without my knowledge or consent to help create a commercial asset that has generated tremendous value for Disney and Cameron,” Kilcher said in the release.
Arnold P. Peter, Mr. Kilcher’s lead attorney, said Mr. Cameron’s tactics were “drawing, not inspiration.”
“He took the unique biometric facial features of a 14-year-old Indigenous girl and put them through an industrial production process, generating billions of dollars in profits without ever asking her permission,” Peter said in the release. “That’s not filmmaking. That’s theft.”
According to the complaint, “This lawsuit is not intended to restrict or punish speech or artistic expression, but rather to redress the unlawful taking of Plaintiff’s property, his own face, which was used as a commercial production asset to generate billions of dollars in profits.”
Kilcher seeks compensatory and punitive damages, deprivation of profits resulting from the use of Kilcher’s likeness, injunctive relief, and publication of redress.
Prime Minister David Cameron and representatives of the Walt Disney Company did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the lawsuit.
