When Is Color-Blind Casting Okay And When Is It Not?
It seems like The Last Airbender has at least 99 problems -- excruciatingly bad 3D, thuddingly clumsy dialogue, sub-Jake Lloydian acting and more -- but should the color of its cast really be one of them? When io9 proffered Community actor Donald Glover as a possible new Spider-Man, the internet seized on it as its new favorite meme. Sure, Glover is black while Peter Parker in the movies, TV shows and comic books has always been white, but Glover is hilarious, as Spidey should be, and could have easily played the part. So why was this move lauded while Airbender has been met with protests and picket lines?
This is an honest question, not some Glenn Beckian prelude to a "poor put-upon white folks" rant. I saw The Last Airbender last night, and while it was just as awful as you might have heard, the color of the leads didn't really bother me in the least. Looking at the original cartoon characters, I suppose they look somewhat "Asian," but I'm not sure if Asia as we know it even exists in the world of Airbender.
I don't know whether the film is supposed to take place on an alien planet, in the distant future or in some Tolkienesque fantasy world, but wherever it was, the presence of giant flying 'n swimming Swiffer duster, some monkey-looking creature that seems like it should be She-Ra's best friend, and a pond filled with God-Koi seem to suggest that it's a world unlike ours today. So I can accept the fact that the four tribes of this strange world are a virtual United Colors of Benetton ad, with the fire, earth, air and water tribes each sporting plenty of multicultural members.
It was, I'm sure, a shock to the devoted fans to see some of their beloved heroes cast in a way that they were not prepared for, just as I'm sure some fans weren't initially ready for a black Kingpin in Daredevil, a black Nick Fury in Iron Man or a black James West in Wild, Wild West. But all three actors worked out very well; Daredevil and Wild, Wild West both had their problems as movies, but casting a white actor wouldn't have solved them.
Like I said, this is an honest question I'm grappling with myself. I'm half-Latin and I always liked seeing someone who looked more like me, or my sisters or my mother pop up on the screen. But I do think that it's somewhat unfair to espouse the benefits of color-blind casting one day, and demand fidelity to the source material the next. The part should go to the actor that can best fulfill the role, and if the director says it's these four, I think there's no reason to not take him at his word. M. Night Shyamalan treated the world and its culture reverently enough -- there were certainly no Rooney-level "Miss Go-Righree!" abominations -- that I think any charges of full-on racism is unfounded. The worst that might be said is that 'ol Manoj was a little tone-deaf in regard to how his casting would play with fans of the original Avatar.
It's a complicated issue and there are strong feelings on both sides, but I think no matter what our race, creed, nationality or sex we can all agree on one thing: The Last Airbender is one shitty movie.
Subscribe to the new Movieline on YouTube
Comments
Just because anime characters aren't typically drawn slanty-eyed and buck-toothed doesn't mean Asians have a secret agenda to Anglicize themselves through anime.
This may come as a shock to many people, but as a matter of fact Asians have the same size eyes as Europeans. Asians also have access to hair dye.
A green haired, glittery eyed school girl with magical powers from the planet Neptune isn't any more inherently European than she is Asian, and if the show she is from establishes that she lives in Japan, grew up in Japan, has a Japanese family, and identifies as Japanese, I don't think it's completely unreasonable to accept the fact that maybe she was intended to be Japanese. For example.
I don't understand the desire for asian characters in this. The voice actors for the cartoon are almost all white.
The creators of the series are white guys. The animation team is white people.
The cartoon characters look like mediterranean europeans.
Where does the "they should be asian" thing come from? The buildings? The fighting style? What kind of messed-up racists demand that a building MUST have a certain race living in it? What kind of messed-up racists demand that a fighting style MUST have practitioners of a certain race?
This is particularly absurd because the notions they're drawn from don't reflect reality anyway. There's similarities, yes, but there's a sincere lack of firestorms summoned by real martial artists of any continent.
There may as well be protests that none of the characters are royal blue aliens. It'd make as much sense, and fit better as an argument, as the "but the continent they're on is obviously CGI" case at least has some real substance.
Hollywood does too have a longstandig practice of whitewashing non-white stories. The difference with the opposite, letting black actors play 'white' roles? Never or rarely ever happened. No, the main difference is of course that the message is to black people is:
you're not even good enough to portray yourself or your group, we're better at being black than you are. Hugely insulting.
I hated seeing Isabel Allendes House of Spirits with only Nordic blue-eyed leads. Sure, Latino's have blue eyes, but that's beside the point. In this day and age, whitewashing is simply not acceptable anymore. How about if we made Braveheart with only Sri Lankan and Latino actors? The howling would never stop.
@Cantank
"The mitigating circumstance shouldn't be "Oh, but we made it for a white audience", because that's just encouraging a kind of self-justifying circularity."
Well-put! I'm gonna use that. Other well known excuses:
- "I never knew black or other non-whites when I grew up" (maker of Friends, George Lucas)
- "We couldn't find any blacks or other non-whites for that job" (any averaged sized company)
and the 'best' of the lame excuses:
- "didn't fit in the team" I mean, don't ever think any non-white person is gonna believe that.
@Teoni:
1. "Anime is technically the Anglozing of Asians, done by Asians."
Oh really? That is soooo NOT what Anime is, that's just what your white Eurocentrist goggles show you. And not all Anime is alike! Btw, what the hell is 'technically'? And most important, shows like Gunslinger Girl simply take place in Europe. How is that Anglocizing?
2. Even IF (big if) Anime is Anglozing of Asians done by Asians, then why should American Anime makers follow the Japanese in a bad practice?
@mr. Horn
"I don't see hollywood doing as much 'Whiting out' minority characters, on the contrary I seen more 'Blacking' that should be white."
Oh yeah? Name one prominent white charachter that has been played by black actor. There's a lot of white Othello's, but no, zilch, nada, nix, nil, black Romeos, for example.
@Teoni:
1. "Anime is technically the Anglozing of Asians, done by Asians."
Oh really? That is soooo NOT what Anime is, that's just what your white Eurocentrist goggles show you. And not all Anime is alike! Btw, what the hell is 'technically'? And most important, shows like Gunslinger Girl simply take place in Europe. How is that Anglocizing?
2. Even IF (big if) Anime is Anglozing of Asians done by Asians, then why should American Anime makers follow the Japanese in a bad practice?
Basically, what you are saying comes down to:
Oh, see how these Jews make jokes about jews, so we can do it too. NO, you can't!
You just don't call black people the N-word. Also, family members can kid around in ways that you as an outsider, cannot. Anyone who doesn't understand that, is ignorantly arrogant.
Yes racism is wrong! No Doubt, but "RACE" itself is not wrong, its what we are and how we define ourselves. Color is a fact of life and if you ignore it it doesn't make you color blind, nor do acknowledging it makes you racist. What if Hollywood decides to make a movie about the first black president of the united states but decides to cast him as anything but black? The very topic would be confusing and conflicting with what your seeing on screen. It may even be laughable.
On fictional characters such as in last air bender, I think its wrong to make a character a certain way... build a huge fan base that follows your story and character for years and then change it at the last moment change it for no good reason at all. (Fans of your series will make up the largest percentage of the people who actually go out and see it... so why piss them off just to please a small minority?)
"If this were Braveheart or Gladiator, where ethnicity plays a huge role in the believability of the story, it would be strange to cast Chinese or black actors to play William Wallace."
I gotta say, even a white William Wallace in Gladiator would have me scratching my head a little. But at least he'd tell those Roman girls off when they dressed improperly. After all, if they ignored him and went out and "got themselves raped", the next thing you know we're right back in this thread again.
On the topic of race-blind casting, I see the new Hawaii Five-O TV show features two white actors in the lead, Alex O'Loughlin and Scott Caan. The old Hawaii Five-O (1968-1980) also featured a couple of white guys in the lead, supported by a few Asian/Pacific Islander actors who never had story lines of their own. In those days, I guess we didn't think this was odd, just as nobody questioned why Mayberry on the Andy Griffith Show was a small North Carolina town that had virtually no black residents, and Sheriff Andy never had any encounters with black people.
But Hawaii has always been a state where whites are in the minority. Shouldn't the 2010 version of Hawaii Five-O have Asian/Pacific Islander actors in the lead? Danial Dae Kim of "Lost" is in the show but so far we've hardly seen him in the promos and has no diologue in any of the spots... it's just standard cop-buddy lines for O'Loughlin and Caan.
I think that the really "funny" thing about all these dicussions about "color" and "racism" is that the REAL racists are all those "pro-color" - they just don't like "white" people and in fact they want the whole population in this world changed/switched to "people of color".
Also very "funny" to see how it is ALWAYS completely OK to be "biased" and give all sorts of "positive special treatment" to "people of color" - do the same thing when it comes to "whites" and you're a "racist" that don't like "people of color". The fact that there is NO country left in the world where "white" people can be left alone to a peacefull exsistence without being "run over" by "the third world" means nothing - but hey! go "Save the whales !" - right ????
Well!!!... atleast the writer of the article above had GUTS and were HONEST when the writer wrote "I’m half-Latin and I always liked seeing someone who looked more like me, or my sisters or my mother pop up on the screen" .
Yeah ! Yeah! , you can discuss all you like but I have spoken the truth and lived long enough to hear all the arguments (and lies) so please "smear" me and all I have written - it's not like I'm going to come back to defend myself - it's not going to make what I have written less truthfull but just confirm the fact that i'm surrounded by idiots (of whatever color - black/""white""/"whatever").
Much ado about nothing. Has anyone ever watched a manga style cartoon before? There is certainly a distinct 'western' appearance to the characters (typically). Sure, maybe directors should try harder to cast blue eyed, blonde asian actors with eyes that cover a third of their face. My guess is that they are hard to find (and would we really want to look at them once the shock wore off). But I think the bottom line is do the actors look like their fictional counterparts? Yes. Are some of us waaaay to worried about political correctness? Yes. And lastly, can we let a kids fantasy action movie be just that without the 'high art' that some 'intellectuals' think every movie should be? Mmmm. Probably not. You might not like it.... but the kids seem to. I don't hear them complaining about any of it.
The thing is, the cartoon was set in an Asian-inspired fantasy world, as opposed to the more common European-inspired fantasy world, so why would the characters be European? And as someone already pointed out, just because they're not drawn slanty-eyed doesn't mean they're not Asian. And why is "white" the default with non-Earthling characters, anyway?
And @ Walk The Line- I agree that the "pro-color/anti-white" attitude is as much racist as "pro-white/anti-color", and that whites are much more prone to being attacked for misconstrued statements, but you can't say that white people are suddenly the only ones whose rights are being trampled on. Things are better than they used to be, to be sure, but we really do have a long way to go before we have true equality.
Question: Do the actors look like their cartoon characters?? HELL NAW, they look like they're from the twighlight movies. Can they act? HELL naw.
Is there a scene in the movie where these guys are standing in front of their WHOLE VILLAGE, and these kids are the only caucasians? True.
Does it make any sense why there is no explanation why the 3 caucasian heroes of this movie are from a tribe of just asian/natives? Anybody watching this movie has gotta laugh, this isn't color-blind casting.
This is called white-casting. They hired a ton of minorities as the background, and picked a white cast.
And don't tell me that Shymalan is part asian, because that dude is straight indian. Which also explains why he hired Indian's in the movie to have the perception that this movie isn't an all-cuacasian story. Too bad.
Having Sam Jackson as Nick Fury makes perfect sense. The Nick Fury that the Iron Man movies are using is from the Ultimates comic books which is a side universe of Marvel which has many differences to characters such as different alter egos for heroes and different origins. In the Ultimates universe not only is Nick Fury a black man with an eye patch but was designed based on Sam Jackson's likeness so having him play Nick Fury is really perfect casting.
As far as Color-Blind casting goes for the most part I think its good but there are some roles that should go to certain people but most of those are pretty obvious not to go with anything but that race in the role such as using black actors to play slaves in movies set in that time in American history even more so if the movie is about slavery itself or about the struggle to gain their freedom. No one would want to see an actor of any other race play Malcolm X or Martin Luther King nor do I think anyone would try it. This is but an example of course as all races have certain roles that should only be casted by people of that race but something like a black Spider-man or white cast members in The Last Airbender rather then asian people I don't see as that big of a deal as long as the actors casted are able to do a good job playing that role.
You know it would be nice to see more (maybe just ONE) Asian protagonists in a OBVIOUSLY ASIAN INFLUENCED Movies, and not just as the antagonist or in the minor roles.
Not like they couldn't find any Asians, who can act; the boy who plays the Avatar wasn't an actor in the first place!
I agree that that move was completely bizarre. I don't care of the director is Indian, that doesn't mean it's okay to cast the bad buys as all Indians(especially since NONE of them were Indian in the show.)
Me and my husband saw it Friday night, and we absolutely loved the film. I do agree they could have done away with the 3-D. It was not needed in the film. Storyline was good and original. Beggers can be choosers. We criticize when there are remakes, but when someone makes
an ORIGINAL FILM its still not good enough. Now judging by the posts its off by only the leading characters. Which I noticed because I am black. There were only three whites playing leading roles. I am satisfied by the diversity of the film. I get sick of all these white washed movies. So NO COMPLAINTS HERE So when I saw Angelina Jolie be cast as Cleopatra. I was surprised it is not Thandie Newton considering everyone knows Cleopatra was B-L-A-C-K.
It is so absolutely stupid. This has nothing to do with Affirmative Action. If it is then this is reversed. The storyline is the airbender is found by a brother and sister from the "south". They are CLEARLY not white and these two pastie white people are playing them? Seriously!, was Jaden Smith unavailable? Was there not a talented black girl in wings? They cast a pair of white kids! Oh, by the way, I am white! I glow in the dark, and I like my films with more color then my skin!
After more then a year of waiting this was the first movie I ever wanted to slap someone over for being so stupid. I really want my mone back from the theater, and I really want my money back they charged for the 3D glasses. They took a potentially wonderful movie and turned it into ....well..I'm not really sure what they turned it into. Night Shyamalan really should beg everyone's forgiveness for doing such an awful job.
When I watched the cartoon I didn't see anyone that looked Asian, or at least the typical Asian as we might think. It was a good cartoon. It was worth the few hours I took each day to watch it. But the movie and the cartoon had clear Asian themes: the architecture, food, clothing, and writings. But why does it matter? I didn't dislike this movie more because I couldn't tell the race of the actors. I didn't like the cartoon more because of the same thing. I didn't like the movie because it was done awfully!! The acting sucked and the script sucked. No amount of special effects -which are on the breaking line of sucking - or good set design can make up for the both the acting and script failure.
Why does anyone care about the race????
It was ridiculous to recast these roles with white people. The boy who played the avatar was a very poor actor, and the movie was awful... Everyone I know hated it. Very disappointing. Eff Shyamalan
I would highly agree. But look at the cartoon. Can you really tell me you can look at all four tribes and convince yourself of four different races?
The brother and sister to me look white with a tan, the blind earth bender clearly is white, Zuko Asian, and Aang, well, I'm not really sure, White and Asian Mix. Sure, there are a few toons who are clearly Asian. Zuko's Uncle was clearly meant to be an aging Asian man. All I am saying is yes, stay as true as you can to the characters original design, but when I see this cartoon, I do not see clearly definable races as a whole in any of the tribes.
That Indian Spider-man was an American one shot off a series they launched in India. That's going to create more of the confusion you are talking about.
Psst -- India is part of Asia.
once and for all that show is NOT ASIAN ....its not anime or not even in a single point related to anything asian why do we otaku always have to say this *sigh* should be obvious that this crap cant be anime 😛 😛 😛
You use Gennnn Beck's name in vain? Everything you said after that is suspect and it cheapens your argument.
Sadly the recasting of white leads is no new thing. Hollywood has done the same thing since it began with colour, race, and historical facts. Consider 300, The patriot, Braveheart, U751, Gladiator or Pearl harbour to name a few.
The $$ potential of a film almost always comes ahead of integrity it seems.
Cleopatra was ethnically Greek.
Next » « Previous