You make it sound like excluding her would be racist somehow. It’s not an issue of exclusion it’s a choice he made to include a character for presumably comedic value who is part Asian but doesn’t look like it, so she has to tell people she is Asian. I’m not saying that’s wrong in any way, but that’s what he did.
Exactly. My siblings and I are all the product of a mixed union, and some of us are darker than the others. I’m probably the darkest and started sprouting a mustache at twelve, while one of my brothers looks like a typical white dude who couldn’t properly grow facial hair until he was twenty. This happens, and trying to seek out someone specifically 25% Hawaiian to create representation would have actually been weird and misguided. If there are other Polynesians in the film, and it’s not all boiled down to stereotypes, then they haven’t miscast anything. Are we going to complain that a white woman voiced Lilo, in Lilo and Stitch, too? Give it a rest. Racial miscasting happens, and a lot, but we should restrict our objections to the many situations where it does apply.
I think a fauxpology was the only kind warranted here.
4 Likes
That’s the best awful thing I’ve learned of this month.
1 Like
My image of how Hollywood works is this…“Emma Stone’s available, I love her and she’ll make bank.” “Is her look right for the role?” “Yep, part of the character’s story is that she looks white.” “Sounds like money, have our people call her people…more gold flakes on your lobster?”
3 Likes
As I pointed out above, the film, set in HAWAII of all places, is described as having fourteen main characters, all of whom are white, except for one who’s mixed, but looks white. Sure seems like more of the same old white usage of exotic people and places as mere backdrops to me, even in the one character who ever so minimally represents something more true about Hawaii’s population. Sure does sound to me like something worth complaining about. Especially after listening to those who are, you know, doing the actual complaining.
1 Like
Almost Famous and Say Anything are both great.
1 Like
Squeaky wheel gets the grease. For all I know they’re in a significant minority. And the movie hasn’t been screened- which is an important detail in ascertaining what the actual fuck is in it. I don’t trust complaints that come before an actual unveiling, because how can anyone know what the treatment is? Never mind that Hawaii has been very effectively ethnically cleansed since the late 1800s and Polynesians are at around 10 percent of the population. It’s like complaining an Australian film managed not to have any major Aboriginal characters.
Never mind that you’ve shifted your objections as soon as you realized that many of them were based on faulty premises.
And also, never mind that the main character has actual Hawaiian heritage. I guess that doesn’t count?
1 Like
Go ahead, keep ignoring context. Stay ignorant. Like I give a fuck.
1 Like
You do, and you’re wrong here. It happens to all of us.
Just to reinforce that a bit, here are the interesting demographics of Hawaii;
Asian: 38.6%
White: 24.7%
Two or more races: 23.6%
Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander: 10%
Hispanic/Latino: 9.8%
Black: 1.6%
Other: 1.2%
American Indian:0.3%
2 Likes
IOW, “Like I give a fuck whether you stay ignorant.”
Read much?
1 Like
Chloe Bennett’s info in that link is quite telling:
In an interview with the Toronto Star, the actress even revealed how changing her name — “Bennett” is her Chinese father’s first name — was the only way she could get work in Hollywood. Because people would only cast her once they thought she was white. Funny, that.
6 Likes
Down here in (highly mixed) New Zealand it’s not so uncommon to find pale skinned, blonde-haired or blue-eyed Māori who are able to proudly recite their whakapapa, yet would easily pass as white if they chose to dissociate from their iwi or moved elsewhere.
It’s possible that the director might have got a more nuanced performance if he’d cast someone who is actually mixed, but it really doesn’t sound like nuance is what the film is about. With the degree of mixing specified, the individual’s outward appearance is likely to be gloriously random and might fit (or not) a variety of races. Just proves how stupid the idea of fixed racial classifications based on phenotype really is … 
4 Likes
I liked the movie. Quite frankly I think it is a shame that the basic design of the movie character is apparently out of the writer’s hands. Because I am sure Crowe is a vicious racist in person. Besides, if people want to see actual Hawaiians they can watch Dog the Bounty Hunter.
He’s just lucky he didn’t wander into gender identity.
Hey! Open your eyes, that film was awesome!
1 Like
This is kinda sounding racist. If you are any part of another race you have to pick an actress to represent that race? How do you do that? I am relatively certain that Frankenstein failed to create his monster; so I guess an obvious visual way of representing multiple races with one actor/actress is going to be tough.
But she didn’t have the stereotypical Hawaiian heritage other movies have led us to believe.
Just to add, in case there are disbelievers out there, mixed race genetics produces interesting variation in hair and skin colour even within the same family. This family in the UK (white european/afro-caribbean). This family in New Zealand (white european/pacific islander).
Now shrug your shoulders and treat them as individual people, rather than discussing which group they fit in or claiming them for a “side”. That’s all I wish for my (mixed) kids.
5 Likes
Amen. I mean, for example, Keanu Reeves is 1/4 Chinese and 1/4 Hawaiian.
Didn’t stop people from getting mad about the Whitest Man on Earth being cast in 47 Ronin.
As if Americans even know what Whitest Person on Earth looks like anymore. My lilly-white redhaired self could join the Chocktaw tribe if only I had one more piece of documentation. Not going to happen, though.
2 Likes
