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[Deepwater]

https://qz.com/960600/whitewashing-ghost-in-the-shell-and-other-hollywood-movies-isnt-just-offensive-its-also-bad-business/

In particular, over the past decade, there have been 18 major studio releases that prominently feature “racially dysmorphic” casting, from 2008’s 21 (which re-imagined a team of mostly Asian-American blackjack players as white characters played by Jim Sturgess, Jacob Pitts and Kevin Spacey), to last year’s Doctor Strange (featuring Tilda Swinton as a white, female Ancient One) and Gods of Egypt (with Gerard Butler as Set, an Egyptian god by way of Scotland), all the way to this year’s Ghost in the Shell. (For the purpose of this analysis, only films that feature white performers in culturally inexplicable settings or depictions, or made to look nonwhite through cosmetics, have been included—not remakes that effectively relocate the narrative into a new setting or situation.)

Of these 18 films, only six were profitable. Of the profitable ones, only three—21, Doctor Strange and Star Trek: Into Darkness (featuring Benedict Cumberbatch as Khan Noonian Singh)—could be rated unqualified hits. But even given these successes, the 18 films will have collectively lost nearly half a billion dollars for their studios, accounting for production and marketing expenses—a staggering amount, even in today’s go-big-or-go-home Hollywood economy.

"b-but bankable actors!"

 

[Col WillieSharp]

Tropic Thunder is white-washed?

 

[blanchot]

Tropic Thunder is white-washed?

there's literally a black main character, i think

 

[Alcotholic]

there's literally a black main character, i think

Played by Robert downy jr.

 

[wanderingprostheyltite]

Good. At least we know it'll improve now, and has to an extent. Now let's see the historical dramas/epics follow suit.

 

[wildfire]

Cloud Atlas is white washing....

Yeah ok Jan.


[edit]

Anyway the main point of the article has merit but everyone who misrepresents Cloud Atlas irks me, greatly.

 

[itxaka]

Cloud atlas? Where is the whitewashing in there? Is there a book or something in which the movie is based? :O

 

[wandering]

Cloud Atlas is white washing....

Yeah ok Jan.

Is this the part where we defend literal yellowface

Ok

 

[Fj0823]

Tropic Thunder is white-washed?

Yes but it was kind of the point of the character

 

[Ratrat]

Tropic Thunder and Cloud Atlas are weird picks. Mad Max deserves a spot more than those.

 

[TheUntamedLegend]

Played by Robert downy jr.

The character played by Robert Downey Jr isn't black.

 

[demented]

I think a lot of these were just terrible movies to begin with.

 

[SCULLIBUNDO]

Is this the part where we defend literal yellowface

Ok

Except you also have Asian and black characters playing white people. It's the point of the film and a really dumb example for the article to use.

 

[LakeEarth]

The character played by Robert Downey Jr isn't black.

Right, he was a dude playing a dude disguised as another dude.

 

[disappeared]

Now I wanna watch Tropic Thunder again.

 

[FortuneFaded]

The Martian?

 

[NOLA_Gaffer]

Speed Racer is too good for this world.

 

[Puppet Shadow]

Where's The Martian? It made over $600 million.

 

[Biggest-Geek-Ever]

Played by Robert downy jr.

ThatsTheJoke.jpg

 

[SheSaidNo]

What about Argo?

 

[T.O.P]

Tropic Thunder was such a good movie

And i need to rewatch Edge of Tomorrow

 

[Napoleonthechimp]

Is this the part where we defend literal yellowface

Ok

They're supposed to be the same person continually reincarnating. It's easy to explain that in the books but in the movies you've got to show it. I don't know how else they'd have been able to do it.

 

[Wuthering_Heights]

I feel like this is reaching.

 

[RS4-]

The Martian?

Initially I instantly though that Mindy Park would be Korean, but then gave it some more thought and didn't have a problem with it.

The Kapoor one was...a kinda lazy way of going about it though.

 

[Con_Smith]

Why is Crank in the list?

 

[pirateluigi]

Tropic Thunder was such a good movie

It really was. I suppose it fits their criteria by the strictest definition but it's very much a stretch to call it white washed.

 

[FortuneFaded]

The Harry Potter film series was accused of whitewashing with Lavender Brown.

 

[Makonero]

It really was. I suppose it fits their criteria by the strictest definition but it's very much a stretch to call it white washed.

White washing is taking a character who was a different race in the source material/reality and making them white, correct? So I don't see how Tropic Thunder fits that definition.

 

[Maple-Tech]

Whitewashing is bad, but a lot of those movies didn't fail because of the whitewashing, but because they were boring. Aloha isn't suddenly going to become profitable by casting an asian actress, it's still a boring rom-com.

 

[SomTervo]

Tropic Thunder is white-washed?

It's sort of a joke, but yeah

 

[ldcommando]

Crank?

 

[Burt]

If you're gonna have Edge of Tomorrow on the list and call out Death Note in the text, you gotta have The Departed in there too. But then I guess that Brolin-Old Boy could balance it out.

 

[Ratrat]

The Social Network too.

 

[Jarmel]

I feel like that chart would have more impact if it wasn't the case that more than half of those films are bad to average.

Also Crank? What?

 

[Mushroomer25]

Tropic Thunder is white-washed?

Yeah, that seems like a stretch. The movie is making a commentary about racial casting in Hollywood, so putting it in the same bucket as the projects it mocks is pretty sketchy.

Additionally, this whole chart is really trying to draw correlation out of causation. Implying these projects bombed because of their casting ignores an infinite number of smaller factors. While it undoubtedly played a hand in movies like Ghost in the Shell underperforming, I don't think people skipped out on The Love Guru because they were offended at the casting. It was just a legitimately awful movie by a star whose appeal had run thin.

 

[Kinyou]

Crank had white washing?

 

[Aaron]

The character played by Robert Downey Jr isn't black.

It's also an original property. So there's nothing being washed.

 

[Gordon Shumway]

Topic Thunder is there as a joke, right? They can't be that stupid..oh, wait..

And what's with Star Trek?

 

[HStallion]

Where's The Martian? It made over $600 million.

Was there white washing in that movie? I've never read the book.

 

[human5892]

Tropic Thunder shouldn't be here. The whitewashing is the whole point of the satire. Robert Downey Jr. is playing a white man who is playing a black man.

 

[RS4-]

Topic Thunder is there as a joke, right? They can't be that stupid..oh, wait..

And what's with Star Trek?

Khan.

Was there white washing in that movie? I've never read the book.

It's just assumed that Mackenzie Davis's character is Korean, because her name is Mindy Park.

Ejiofor's character is named Vincent Kapoor. So people naturally thought it'd be someone of Indian decent.

The books don't exactly describe characters anyway.

 

[pirateluigi]

White washing is taking a character who was a different race in the source material/reality and making them white, correct? So I don't see how Tropic Thunder fits that definition.

Only because they defined it this way:

For the purpose of this analysis, only films that feature white performers in culturally inexplicable settings or depictions, or made to look nonwhite through cosmetics, have been included

It technically fits, but it isn't white washing and really shouldn't be included.

 

[Kinyou]

what's with Star Trek?

I guess that one is about Khan

 

[Pieman0920]

Star Trek: Into Darkness (featuring Benedict Cumberbatch as Khan Noonian Singh

Man, eugenics stuff and whatnot aside, Khan's never going to register as Indian to me.

 

[KarmaCow]

Topic Thunder is there as a joke, right? They can't be that stupid..oh, wait..

And what's with Star Trek?

Khan Noonien Singh played by Benedict Cumberbatch.

Though in TOS, he was played by Ricardo Montalban so the character has been fucked since his inception.

 

[Sgt. Kabukiman]

I get the point that this article is trying to make but yeah... A lot of bad examples.
And most of these films would have failed no matter what.

 

[Mushroomer25]

I feel like that chart would have more impact if it wasn't the case that more than half of those films are bad to average.

Also Crank? What?

I feel like the real story of this chart is that studios who think whitewashing is a great idea aren't very good at making profitable films.

 

[bonesmccoy]

I don't know if you can really say that The Love Guru would have been saved if Mike Myers had written it to be less 'culturally inexplicable', whatever that means.

 

[Makonero]

Was there white washing in that movie? I've never read the book.

There's a character with the last name of Park who is supposed to be Korean who is white in the film, and there was a character with the last name of Kapoor played by an African American. There's some weird racebending in that movie.

 

[bigkrev]

Topic Thunder is there as a joke, right? They can't be that stupid..oh, wait..

And what's with Star Trek?

Khan was originally played by a Mexican actor.
I have no idea why Crank is on this list