Cuuuuuuz it wouldn't of made as much money if it was an all asian cast.
The greatest trick I ever pulled was convicing the devil I didn't exist.
Common excuse, but if you think about it it's such crap. Did the white guy do anything for this movie? No. Nobody knew who he was before and nobody knew who he was after. Ironically the sidekick Aaron Yoo is currently having a better career. The known actors (Bosworth, Fishburne, and Spacey) sold this.
And so Governor Devlin, because even the cost of freedom can be too high, I REFUSE your pardon!
actually a lot of people know who jim sturgess is, and who he was before the movie.
There's just a possibility that I will kiss a doorknob.
T~O #210
errrr MANY people know who jim sturgess is, and not because of this film.
shareWho, his mom and dad? F_ucker is a nobody.
And so Governor Devlin, because even the cost of freedom can be too high, I REFUSE your pardon!
Nah he in't. he's actually quite talented, in fact, very talented.
shareBeing talented and being famous are two entirely different things. There's plenty of people who are talented but not famous, and plenty of people who are famous but not talented.
And so Governor Devlin, because even the cost of freedom can be too high, I REFUSE your pardon!
I didn't know they were white till you told me, now I'm a racist!
shareJim Sturgess is very well-known, and is quickly rising in the ranks among Hollywood's A-list. All that is proven by you not knowing him is that you don't know whose up and coming in the film industry. Check out his resume, he's a star who can carry a film all on his own (well, usually he has a pretty famous leading lady), and while Aaron Yoo is talented and all, how is he currently having a better career? He's a supporting actor in all of his roles.
"There isn't any more, you drank the whole fairy...and you're going to your room."
No, he isn't. Blake Lively is a rising A lister, so is Emma Stone, Jesse Eisenberg, even Robert Pattinson. Jim Nobody is not. None of his movies since this one have made any impact whatsoever. Most I don't think even made it to theaters (or at least wide-release). One Day (which doesn't even give him top billing), his latest, is a limited release that is going nowhere. And before 21, he wasn't in anything of note other than Across the Universe, which did not set the box office on fire (Boleyn was out around the same time as 21). And since 21 would have been put into production long before ATU came out, there was no way he was hired on any degree of fame.
Aaron Yoo we actually see in stuff. Nick and Norah, Friday the 13th, Gamer, Nightmare on Elm Street, The Closer.
And I can assure you I know many actors. I've argued against people who claimed Tobey Maguire and Daniel Craig weren't known before their big franchise roles. But that just isn't the case here.
And so Governor Devlin, because even the cost of freedom can be too high, I REFUSE your pardon!
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While I can't and won't defend the casting decision to cast the major cahracters as Caucasian, I knew who "the white guy" was when I saw him, because I recognised him from not one but two other movies I'd seen him in prior to this one.
sharehozzyboy wrote:
Cuuuuuuz it wouldn't of made as much money if it was an all asian cast.
They said that once DECADES ago about Black characters. Good thing people were willing to shed their racism. Well judging by your nonchalant acceptance of this inequality, not "all" people.... ;)
Dr. Kila Marr was right. Kill the Crystalline Entity.share
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[Cuuuuuuz it wouldn't of made as much money if it was an all asian cast. ]
This kind of troubling excuse has been used in the past to justify discrimination and prejudice against women and many other minority groups in the workplace, etc.
Iunno. Why did Bollywood replace Superman with an Indian Superman?
shareThat's different. Bollywood is the film industry of another country. Indonesia and the Phillipines routinely rip of western movies and remake them with indigenous casts. But that comparison is idiotic. This is an AMERICAN movie and the true story happened in AMERICAN with AMERICANS who happened not to be white. Get a grip.
Dr. Kila Marr was right. Kill the Crystalline Entity.share
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Because it's Hollywood. In the golden age of movies, they would use Caucasians to play Native Americans, Egyptians, Asians, and even African Americans. Makes some people feel better, safer; which translates into more money at the box office.
If you want the majority of Americans to come out to a movie, you give them something they can identify with.
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Uh, I was trying to answer the op's question and prove a point, lol. By the way, I'm African-American and I hate the way Hollywood whitewashes everything. I thought that was apparent in my first post, especially the first paragraph. Oh well.
share"If you want the majority of Americans to come out to a movie, you give them something they can identify with."
But that's simply not true. Look at the success of Slumdog Millionaire. America is a multicultural society. You need to understand that the Asians in this movie are Asian-AMERICANS. Those watching this movie would be able to identify with the common experience that is being uniquely American. A college kid going to a prestigious AMERICAN college, grappling with uniquely AMERICAN issues (like paying for the outrageous cost of college) that all college kids grapple with, etc. There is nothing in the Asian American characters that would make them seem particularly foreign and hard to identify with other than the color of their skin.
Hollywood, by playing to the false maxim that you present only ends up reinforcing that maxim due to the strong role the movies play in reinforcing perceived stereotypes.
Some fellows get credit for being conservative when they are only stupid.
- Kin Hubbard
"If you want the majority of Americans to come out to a movie, you give them something they can identify with."
The point I was trying to make with this statement is that that was why the producers changed the parts from Asian American to Caucasian American. I was trying to answer the OP, not push a certain agenda.
I agree that this is a multicultural society, and that is what I love about America and I believe in diversity and I want better representation of our diversity in movies. If I had been a producer, I would have left it as it was - with Asian American characters. However - whoever the producers were, they chose not to do that. And one of the main things that motivates producers is making money and my theory is that they thought "If you want the majority of Americans to come out to a movie, you give them something they can identify with."
That is the only reason I made that statement, but of course I can not read minds, but I was simply trying to answer the question in the OP.
As for Slumdog Millionaire example, that movie was based in India and not America and dealt with poverty and extreme hardship, whereas this movie was based in America and at an elite school.
I think in this day and age the whole "identify with" theory is crap, it only applies to actual bigots and racists of which the numbers are dwindling fast.
Harold and Kumar has a Korean and Indian lead, and moreover, has them with a Latina and white woman, and tons of white people love the movies (and the movies were MADE by white people).
The producers casted white people as the leads because they were the best for the role.
Since "actual bigots and racists.. are dwindling fast," that means that there are still some left, so I'll stick with my original theory. Maybe if the producers had been truer to the original story, it would have done better, both critically and commercially.
Follow me on twitter @sydsmoviepicks
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You can't use Slumdog Millionaire as an example of white America supporting a movie about people of color. Slumdog was about Indians IN INDIA. To market a movie about American college students to the majority population, the cast will have to be mostly white. I can't believe this is confusing some people.
shareSeriously though, why? You're not making the slightest bit of sense. Why can't American audiences identify with lead characters that aren't white? This is a diverse country. These are Asian AMERICANS with uniquely AMERICAN experiences here that Americans would be able to identify with. For your claim to be true there would have to be no successful movies of movies based in America of Americans with lead characters that are anything other than white.
shareBecause Hollywood films market mostly to White America and White America is probably not going to support a movie with an all Asian team ripping off Las Vegas. Now, film producers would never admit that (in public), but you can be assured that this was part of the thought process that went into the casting decisions.
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That doesn't explain the acceptance of African Americans in all manners of entertainment. Black Americans have 'made it' in a way that they are easily accepted by 'white America' as you put it. They are our sports heroes, our music stars, and some of our biggest A List actors (Will Smith? Denzel? Morgan?) But they had to fight for that over decades. I thought we were beyond that, but apparently Asians are the last frontier when it comes to racial bigotry inside of "LIBERAL" Hollywood. It's the passive racism of 'ignoring you' versus 'persecuting you'. Deciding unilaterally that any portrayal of a certain group is just not acceptable. Pushing them back into the shadows is the better plan.
It's ironic. I'm in California. Asians OUTNUMBER Blacks and Gays in this state, but you would never know it, if Hollywood (movies, Tv, etc.) were any indicator of that. :)
Dr. Kila Marr was right. Kill the Crystalline Entity.share
"It's ironic. I'm in California. Asians OUTNUMBER Blacks and Gays in this state, but you would never know it, if Hollywood (movies, TV, etc.) were any indicator of that. :) "--StoneGriffin
You have all good points and I won't debate them. I think the problem is that somehow Hollywood has become the de facto movie industry and that industry is controlled by a very small segment of the American population really can not realistically satisfy all the racial, ethnic and gender demographics of such a large continent as North America.
BTW, on my visit to Los Angeles I was astonished at just how large the Hispanic population was and how that was not reflected in the hundreds of Hollywood movies that I have seen that took place in Los Angeles. As I said, the Hollywood film industry is controlled by the world view of a very small ethnic minority in this country. When the behind-the scenes decision makers are more diverse, this will reflect what we see in movies.
Live Full & Die Empty. Tap Your Potential and Realise Your Dreams!
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by - endracismforever on Sat Jul 2 2011 14:57:32
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"When the behind-the scenes decision makers are more diverse, this will reflect what we see in movies."
cracker Jew been owning Hollywood for over 100 yr. it wont get more diverse since t hey don't let it.
My response:
You're not taking into account that there are alternative film industries cropping up in many other states than California and New York that are not being controlled by European Jews and that have ambitions to make better movies that have the polish of Hollywood product. Hollywood will either have to adopt of lose more and more of the American market.
Just take a look at the selections available of Hulu or Crackle and you will see many very polished movies coming from Europe and Asia. Nigeria has the second largest film output just behind India. Hollywood won't be able to pull silly stunts like casting Caucasian in roles that should have gone to Asian actors/actresses if Hollywood executives know that there are other film industries that will make a competing project with more inclusive casting.
Live Full & Die Empty. Tap Your Potential and Realise Your Dreams!
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African Americans in the film industry routinely complain about the narrow nature of roles offered up to them. Things have progressed from the time when black actors could only get roles as criminals, but there's still a narrower range of available roles for black actors or actresses outside of movies made specifically for black audiences. There's a few superstars who have managed to more or less transcend this stereotyping, such as Morgan Freeman, Denzel Washington, Will Smith, and maybe Chris Rock in the realm of comedy. But you generally won't see black actors headlinging, for example, a romantic comedy unless it's something from the Tyler Perry oeuvre. Outside of films which are directed by black directors you rarely see a black actor in the lead other than the couple of aforementioned superstars.
But blacks have more presence in Hollywood because they have more presence in the US. African-Americans are something like 15% of the US population as opposed to something like maybe 5% for Asian Americans. African Americans have also remained the most significant racial minority in the US throughout our history (by which I mean in terms of impact and traditional concern. When people talk about 'race relations' in the US they generally mean interactions between whites and blacks). Beyond this greater numerical propensity you also have a greater presence in film making itself. I named a couple of major black stars above and some of those guys like Morgan Freeman or Denzel Washington, are among the biggest stars in Hollywood. There's no comparable Asian American star to Denzel Washington. The biggest Asian stars in Hollywood are all foreign born and their roles tend to be clustered in the action genre. But blacks have also had more of their own cinema as well. Interestingly just the other night I saw a documentary about depictions of Asians in Hollywood and one Asian-American professor who studies film history commented that while there are some Asian-American made movies there's just no tradition like there is of the "race film" in black cinema. "Race movies" were movies made in the early 20th century by black film makers for black audiences. Springing out of this kind of tradition you've got a pretty robust tradition of black film making as represented in genres like Blaxploitation and directors like Spike Lee or John Singleton. While you did have a vogue for martial arts films in the 70s and 80s, the Asian-American film making presence just isn't as robust as that of African Americans.
"Unless Alpert's covered in bacon grease, I don't think Hugo can track anything."
I wouldn't cry over those stats. They are FAR MORE represented commensurate to their numbers! African Americans make up only 12.8% of the population. HISPANICS make up over 13%. There was Newsweek cover story when the Latino population FINALLY overtook the black population. Asians/Pacific Islanders are around 4.5.
But there are FACTORS which are ignored. Black Americans have a huge population density in places like Washington DC, Detroit and the South. Southern urban areas like Atlanta or New Orleans, etc. have a HUGE African American population. But many forget that Hollywood is in CALIFORNIA. Blacks are only 6% of the population in California. Asians are 7.9%. Any Hollywood Exec would be more likely to see an Asian American than an African American based purely on statistics.
You DID flesh out more history on my original point, though. I was aware of 'black cinema' especially during the 1920s to the 1950s, but blacks at the time were the single LARGEST minority in the U.S. But that was history, and these black trailblazers still made things better for those who came after them. But seriously? It hasn't gotten any better since then? for some races?
This is 2011. Hollywood is STILL RACIST? The irritant is that we haven't learned. We're just bigoted against ANOTHER minority group. Case in point, I saw several films where the scene took place in either an engineering lab or a nano-technology or bio-engineering clean room. NO ASIANS, not even amongst the non speaking 'extras', but there were plenty of blacks. WTF? You KNOW that in real life, those fields are dominated by Asians. What's so hard about putting nonspeaking Asians as extras? That's like not casting a single black actor on the starting squad of an NBA basketball team. That's ridiculous, but then again, that's the racism of 'ignoring you' versus 'persecuting you.
I would not by that sympathetic to blacks complaining though. They get TONS of work compared to all other non-white races in the entertainment biz. And African Americans DOMINATE many other fields (music, sports, etc. must I go on?) I used to live in a house in L.A. with six Asian American actors. They struggled mightily to get ANY work. My Black actor friends were booked all the time. Have you watched Television recently? The majority of all Commercials, whether it be for breakfast cereals, tools, furniture, moving services, etc. etc. has black actors, far in excess of any other race. This is GREAT NEWS for my working black actor friends. But to ignore the agencies going overboard in being politically correct and ONLY hiring one minority racial group ... is dishonest.
Again, I still think it would have to take DECADES like the African American entertainers had to do, in order to fully establish themselves into the mainstream thought as 'fellow Americans'. Asians don't have that. One BIG problem is that there are too many RECENT Asian immigrants. I was shocked to hear that in Northern California there were MORE Foreign born Asians living and working than native born Asian Americans. WTF? That's like having more AFRICAN nationals walking around on the streets than black americans. I think THAT is why the mainstream mindset is that Asians are still 'foreigners' even though they are Americans. I myself still think that way about Middle Eastern people sometimes. But MY REAL POINT is that if a story was ABOUT an event with Middle Eastern People, I would not replace all of them with Caucasian characters. That's offensive. :)
Good to read your post. I liked reading it.
I supposed I'm just still pissed off that they're considering re-making "The Seven Samurai" ... and casting Will Smith in the lead. WTF?!?!?!
Dr. Kila Marr was right. Kill the Crystalline Entity.share
Do you know what Jewish population of America is? 1% ONE F_UCKING PERCENT. Is the media proportioned the same?
And so Governor Devlin, because even the cost of freedom can be too high, I REFUSE your pardon!
Actually the Jewish population is 2%, but yes, they do seem to control the major media outlets far more than their numbers would support, and that has been rich fodder for TONS of anti Jewish conspiracy theories. But .... I tend to lean towards the view that certain cultures embrace certain occupations. There are far more Jewish DOCTORS commensurate to their numbers than other groups (perhaps other than East Asians and East Indians). East Asians (Chinese, Korean, etc.) have tons more people as engineers or technicians in the high tech fields. Jews favor banking, media enterprises/journalism, Law and medicine because those fields are highly regarded in their culture.
Go to a very typical neighborhood of certain races of people and ask them "What type of job would you want your child to have when they're adults?" I can guarantee that the answer from the man in the street, in the predominantly black areas or hispanic areas would be VERY different than the predominantly Jewish areas, or East Indian areas. Culture has a lot with what type of job you gravitate towards.
But I'm a little mystified by your observation as to how 'Jews control the media" which technically there is just a lot of Jewish Americans in the media/broadcast/Journalism fields or who own media producers/distribution .... and how it relates to Hollywood elites replacing Asians with Caucasian characters.
Dr. Kila Marr was right. Kill the Crystalline Entity.share
It was the quote of the other poster:
"But blacks have more presence in Hollywood because they have more presence in the US. African-Americans are something like 15% of the US population as opposed to something like maybe 5% for Asian Americans."
When a group with lower numbers than those have the hugest representation, then obviously the population statistics are irrelevant.
And so Governor Devlin, because even the cost of freedom can be too high, I REFUSE your pardon!
"But I'm a little mystified by your observation as to how 'Jews control the media" which technically there is just a lot of Jewish Americans in the media/broadcast/Journalism fields or who own media producers/distribution .... and how it relates to Hollywood elites replacing Asians with Caucasian characters."
Well, to start off with the lead character (who should have been Asian) was replaced by a Jewish actor (Sturgess).
Some fellows get credit for being conservative when they are only stupid.
- Kin Hubbard
StoneGriffin and some others have said so much about this systematic racism that I don't have to say much.
Message to Hollywood and all other film industries: cast people in their appropriate role and no one will lose profit. If money isn't the issue, then it can only be bigotry and everything under it.
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"cracker in case you don't know they also take money from outside of America. watching a Hollywood movie in Asia is not free either cracker. "
Now it's not, but anything Hollywood markets in other countries is a novelty to non Whites and so they don't mind the change in casting. I suspect that most of the posters complaining on this board are Asian-Americans who want to be validated as part of the mainstream American culture, perfectly understandable.
Live Full & Die Empty. Tap Your Potential and Realise Your Dreams!
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"you did nothing to answer my point exept to deny every thing and pull excuse out of your ass cracker. america is not the only market crakcer. now you are saying non white ppl dont mind change in casting. and how do you know this cracekr? you dont know this cracker. y ou are making it up since you are a racist that dont want to threaten your white privielge."
"so you are a rcist too. any one that complaining must be asian. so it is not a legit argument to call this racist. youa re saying it must be ppl whining to be part of the mainstream. what a load of racist bs from t his cracker. "
"youa re saying there is a film industry competition. ther eis not cracker. that is how hollywood can take good asian movie and remake them staring white ppl and sell them around the world as a original work-including in asia cracker. "
My response:
Lol, you're a funny guy endracismforever!
I think I made my case, Hollywood is marketing to mostly the western market which is predominantly Caucasian. Since that is where most of the money is coming from, that is where they are going to market their product. It's about the money, always has been and always will be.
Live Full & Die Empty. Tap Your Potential and Realise Your Dreams!
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Look at the summer blockbusters, most of them have disappointed at the box office. It's not just that they are too highly budgeted but it is also that the casts are mostly White. So, in a way you're right about Hollywood. But Hollywood is going to make movies that they think will be profitable, so you can expect casting stunts like that of "21" to continue. By the way, remember how "The Prince of Persia" bombed?. It's going to change, but slowly , endracismforever.
Live Full & Die Empty. Tap Your Potential and Realise Your Dreams!
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Business. Hollywood assume that American audiences will not go to see a movie with Asian leads unless it's a martial arts movie.
"Unless Alpert's covered in bacon grease, I don't think Hugo can track anything."
Check out this article on CRACKED.com! LOL! I'm not the only white dude who was flabbergasted by the whitewash of this movie!! HAHAHAHAHA
(see the section on THIS film in the article) :D
http://www.cracked.com/article_16478_7-movies-based-true-story-that-are-complete-b******t.html?wa_user1=2&wa_user2=Movies+%26+TV&wa_user3=article&wa_user4=recommended
(note: Wow! Talk about an insane profanity filter IMDB has. In this url, replace the censored b******t part with the "manure from bulls" and you'll get to where you want to go.)
Dr. Kila Marr was right. Kill the Crystalline Entity.share