Khan, based on his name, should be Indian. It's a bizarre choice that Khan has never been portrayed accurately lol
-
Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.
Quartz: Over the last decade, whitewashed movies lost nearly half a billion dollars
- Thread starter Deepwater
- Start date
- Status
Khan, based on his name, should be Indian. It's a bizarre choice that Khan has never been portrayed accurately lol
White washing is a problem but that chart is doing a pisspoor job.
Yeah, ignoring the ugly historical connotations of yellowface is not a good look, no matter how you try and cut it. Doesn't help that the "whiteface" makeup done in the film is visibly of a much higher quality than the slipshod slanted eyes they tried to give the white actors.
FortuneFaded
Member
Argo & Passion Of The Christ also.
Isn't this more a list of horrible movies with a few exceptions? White washing doesn't affect box office, poor scripts/editing/acting do.
Also, I wouldn't consider Speed Racer white washed. It isn't known for the original manga/anime, I'm a big anime fan and never even seen any of the original Mach GoGoGo stuff. It was popular world wide from the Western version, which is drastically edited/different from the original Japanese release and clearly set in America and focused on characters like Sprittle/Chim-chim - are they even in the Japanese version? Also, the character designs are very westernized.
Also, I wouldn't consider Speed Racer white washed. It isn't known for the original manga/anime, I'm a big anime fan and never even seen any of the original Mach GoGoGo stuff. It was popular world wide from the Western version, which is drastically edited/different from the original Japanese release and clearly set in America and focused on characters like Sprittle/Chim-chim - are they even in the Japanese version? Also, the character designs are very westernized.
Khan is an Indian name? Thought it was a Mongolian title. Man using Khan in that movie was so silly he should have just been one of Khan's people and left Khan in a pod.
bobbychalkers
Member
Some of their inclusions are a bit weird. Tropic Thunder is whitewashed on purpose, and as messy as Cloud Atlas is, I can understand the purpose of why they did it. Still doesn't make seeing Keith David and company in yellowface any better.
Machine
Member
I get that Edge of Tomorrow is based on a Japanese light novel but the writer goes on to say that they aren't counting "remakes that effectively relocate the narrative into a new setting or situation." Since the movie did change the narrative to a new setting, the writer seems to be ignoring their own rules.
Genuine curiosity here and this might be something I read, or literally in the film but wasn't that explained? I really don't know how to explain this without making it sound absolutely not like what I'm trying to say; but wasn't it a future of blended races?
Seriously, I don't remember much about it anymore and I don't know where I got the idea from but uh I don't want to make this thread about that film so correct me if I'm wrong.
There are obvious cases of white-washing but in that film I felt there was an actual point to it's initial absurdity. It's been so long so I don't know really.
This. I agree white-washing is a real problem in Hollywood, but I don't buy the premise behind the OP. I mean, fuck, The Love Guru? There's no saving a film like no matter who you cast.
Many of these movies are highly debatable in their alleged white washing (which itself is a real problem in Hollywood and elsewhere), and the causality is just not demonstrated at all.
The movies who fared poorly on hat list did not do so because of Whitewashing, and those who did well did not do so thanks to whitewashing either.
The movies who fared poorly on hat list did not do so because of Whitewashing, and those who did well did not do so thanks to whitewashing either.
PeskyToaster
Member
Argo is a bit tricky since the guy it's based on has a Spanish name but doesn't identify as hispanic
http://nbclatino.com/2013/01/10/argos-real-tony-mendez-im-not-hispanic/
I haven't seen the movie, but just looking at Wikipeida it appears David Carradine plays a character named "Poon Dong"
I think this is him in this mildly NSFW clip
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PNKIFQuN7hQ
Speed Race is kind of a tricky one on that list.I don't think a sizable audience would connect with a "Mach Go Go Go" movie. What we got here in the states became a piece of Americana through the dub. People are familiar with the Racer family and not the Mifune family.
Khan is named after someone Gene Roddenberry knew. He named another character with a similar name in The Next Generation. Khan Noonian Soong who was played by Brent Spiner (Data's actor) I think you could write that one off as being white because it is a slightly alien origin for that characte.
kunonabi
Member
Good writing and acting. But it's the wachowskies so maybe that was off the table. Still doesn't excuse it though.
Wrestlemania
Banned
I don't think the point is that they're failing because of the whitewashing. Often the argument is that whitewashing is needed to put bankable actors in the roles, but evidently it's really not paying dividends, so why do it?
Count Dookkake
Member
The Love Guru? Really?
HellforLeather
Member
Uh yea...thats the joke.
So I guess white washing is to blame and not the fact that, with a few exceptions, those movies were absolute dogshit?
freeofgreed
Member
What was the deal with Crank? I thought that was an original franchise?
Yes, Mongolian would have been fine too. Or Persian. Or Turkish.
https://www.ancestry.com/name-origin?surname=khan
also, "Singh" is a common Indian last name
freeofgreed
Member
At first I was like "WTF are you talking about?" until I remembered Hugo Weaving's character.
hydrophilic attack
Member
Very interesting. But the article would have made a stronger case with a statistical analysis where they tried to control for other variables that could possibly have affected profitability
I can't be the only one who read this in Downey's voice right?. I love this movie so much and I'm still amazed that I only realized that Tom Cruise was in this until the very end where they showed his name lol.
Lot people saying this in this thread. The article isn't saying these films failed because of whitewashing. It's saying the whitewashing didn't save [/s]these films. Which might actually be worse from a certain point of view.
There's also some cherry picking going on. The Martian is just as White Washed as Strange. Perhaps moreso. It also made a ton of money.
Wrestlemania
Banned
Have different actors in the roles? The book manages to get across the reincarnation aspect without being able to identify them being the same person visually, so a film should be able to do it as well.
tearsintherain
Member
Yeah that seems like a very selective listing, like "here's a bunch of movies that kinda sucked, bombed, and they had a lot of white actors in them in roles that should have probably gone to minorities".
Ben-Hur lost a TON of money last year - over $100m budget, probably $150m after marketing, made less than $26m domestic and had a pretty diverse cast. It didn't flop because it had a diverse cast, it flopped because it wasn't very good. Ghostbusters would be another example.
It would I think be harder to find a movie that is critically acclaimed as really, really good and still flopped at theaters. All the flops of 2016 - Gods of Egypt, Bad Santa 2, Allegiant, Alice 2, Ghostbusters - were just badly reviewed movies. The only movie I can really think of that flopped but was warmly received was Popstar but even that didn't review THAT high.
Nowadays word of mouth is so significant, millions of people are out there tweeting and msging if a movie is worth it or not and a quick global consensus seems to formulate within a day of release, and woe beholds any movie that does not pass the cut.
Ben-Hur lost a TON of money last year - over $100m budget, probably $150m after marketing, made less than $26m domestic and had a pretty diverse cast. It didn't flop because it had a diverse cast, it flopped because it wasn't very good. Ghostbusters would be another example.
It would I think be harder to find a movie that is critically acclaimed as really, really good and still flopped at theaters. All the flops of 2016 - Gods of Egypt, Bad Santa 2, Allegiant, Alice 2, Ghostbusters - were just badly reviewed movies. The only movie I can really think of that flopped but was warmly received was Popstar but even that didn't review THAT high.
Nowadays word of mouth is so significant, millions of people are out there tweeting and msging if a movie is worth it or not and a quick global consensus seems to formulate within a day of release, and woe beholds any movie that does not pass the cut.
Well it's not like they spent any money on the fight choreography or bending effects so I can kinda see how.
Arkage
Banned
I mean, you can easily claim that the movie would have done even worse without a bankable actor. Not really sure what it's attempting to say, really.
Budget was $150 mil according to wiki. BO was over $300 mil what the fuckkkk people.
I watched it when it was free on Amazon Prime. It was fucking terrible. Never watched the show, but I was interested in an M. Night trainwreck. It delivered.
Random Painted HIghway
Member
journalists should leave the stats heavy lifting to folks actually qualified to perform useful and thoughtful analysis. This piece is just a mess. Amateur hour here.
- Status