I think if I were Egyptian and I saw a movie about my culture being portrayed by an all-white cast, I'd be at least a little amused by that.
I think if I were an Egyptian actor and I saw a movie about my culture being portrayed by an all-white cast after I had auditioned for that movie, I'd be (justifiably) irritated.
The funny thing is, Egyptians are maybe the one famous culture where this wouldn't be an actual problem on the grounds that there are no actual Egyptians, only people who live in Egypt. They were literally whitewashed (or greekwashed/ottowashed/turkwashed/etc) in real life to the point where none of them could read Egyptian.
@dee I know I'm radically counter-cultural on this, but I truly believe "cultural appropriation" is merely a product of a hyper-sensitive generation. The Ancient Greeks took all the Egyptian Gods an assigned them Greek identities. The Romans took all the Greek gods and gave them Roman Identities. Jesus has been portrayed as every ethnicity in the world, both by people who knew better and by people who didn't. Santa Claus has been portrayed with multiple ethnicities. Again, so what? People who care will learn and will know better, at least in this day and age they will (especially for Santa Claus, seriously people!). Historically Jesus was portrayed as white mainly by European artists who had no idea there was any other way a man could be. Just like Bible stories artistically depicted soldiers in medieval armor because artists didn't understand technology had changed in 2000 years; OR EVEN by artists who did know better but wanted their work to be more accessible to their audience.
If we're dealing with material more clearly historical or true to life more efforts should be made to be faithful to the source, including a look and manerisms that are fitting to the characters. Seeing John Wayne play Ghengis Kahn will be a distraction to most modern viewers; and that's probably good, it means viewers are a little more sophisticated, at least in that regard, than they were 50 years ago.
35 years ago I was directing a high school play and cast mother and son characters with actors from different races. Was I progressive or just being funny? I had no interest in social issues at the time, and I still don't. I made a casting decision based on what I thought would work best with the people available. And I can't bring myself to care about the issue at any more depth than that.
I think if I were Egyptian and I saw a movie about my culture being portrayed by an all-white cast, I'd be at least a little amused by that.
I think if I were an Egyptian actor and I saw a movie about my culture being portrayed by an all-white cast after I had auditioned for that movie, I'd be (justifiably) irritated.
The funny thing is, Egyptians are maybe the one famous culture where this wouldn't be an actual problem on the grounds that there are no actual Egyptians, only people who live in Egypt. They were literally whitewashed (or greekwashed/ottowashed/turkwashed/etc) in real life to the point where none of them could read Egyptian.
This is exactly right. There was one dynasty that was Numidian, and another, perhaps the most famous, the Ptolemaic were Greek. The most famous Ptolemy was Cleopatra VII who the first of the dynasty who could even speak Egyptian.
@heindrich I can agree with most of that. I do think this problem is overblown in mainstream media, at least to say I think diversity in casting actually represents our population diversity pretty closely (at least in the US). But there is a level of ill will between groups that defies any objective reality.
@atcDave I'm not sure if you're aware of it, but "cultural appropriation isn't a problem" isn't the same thing as "cultural appropriation doesn't exist". The Romans stealing the Phoenician gods from the Greeks is a classic example of cultural appropriation.
If you don't think it's a problem, that's certainly debatable. But it's definitely a thing that happens, that has happened in the past, that will probably happen again in the future. And in general, it's not a bad thing: it's one group of people adopting something from another group of people because they like it or because it resonates with them. It expands people's horizons, and that's awesome.
But the shadow of that sunny side is that more often than not, the appropriators don't pay due credit to the cultures they're stealing from. The Greeks said "These are our gods now, we created them so they're ours"; then the Romans said "These are our gods now, we created them so they're ours".
Europeans said "Jesus is white because we're white, so he's definitely white". And then hundreds of years later, in a white-dominant society, iconography in the western world claims that Jesus is white and the majority of people believe that claim, because of course he is, look at all the artwork!
And suddenly (or not so suddenly) we lose sight of the culture we've stolen from, and we wrongly assume that that culture is our enemy because their version of history and our version of history are not the same, and there's no way our version could be wrong.
That is cultural appropriation's effects, over a great span of time. In the micro scale, Gods of Egypt is a film made by one man who made a mistake in casting, and it resulted in a film that looks like a white-washing of history. And one film probably won't make a difference. And the director of that film should be forgiven for making an honest mistake--or at least, for making what certainly *looks* like an honest mistake. Casting for talent is definitely admirable; the unfortunate thing is that by casting all white actors, he inadvertently excluded a whole mass of talent that might have been just as effective and at least twice as appropriate for the subject matter.
It's not like some evil thing that has to be regulated and censored. But it's something that should be paid attention to--because we know (from history) what can happen if it's ignored.
@dee yes I realize such things happen, that's why I mentioned several examples. It's whether we are to believe they are particularly significant that we part ways.
I find it funny people are throwing around the concept of "white-washing history" as though this was a serious historical film.
Not being historical means you don't need to cast people who look "Egyptian" (whatever that might have meant 10,000 years ago), but it means you have no reason not to cast actors of any other ethnicity either.
I believe one of the reasons ITV's (British TV) Beowulf is so bad is the decision to set it in a fantasy "Shieldlands". A desision I suspect was made so the cast could be more representative of the ethnic mix of modern Britain, rather than early medievil Denmark.
But I maintain that poor script is a far greater sin than misjudged casting; and every bad fantasy film makes it less likely that further genre films will be made. Holywood gets the impression that the public don't like fantasy, when the truth is the public doesn't like lousy screenplays.
I find it funny people are throwing around the concept of "white-washing history" as though this was a serious historical film.
Not being historical means you don't need to cast people who look "Egyptian" (whatever that might have meant 10,000 years ago), but it means you have no reason not to cast actors of any other ethnicity either.
I believe one of the reasons ITV's (British TV) Beowulf is so bad is the decision to set it in a fantasy "Shieldlands". A desision I suspect was made so the cast could be more representative of the ethnic mix of modern Britain, rather than early medievil Denmark.
But I maintain that poor script is a far greater sin than misjudged casting; and every bad fantasy film makes it less likely that further genre films will be made. Holywood gets the impression that the public don't like fantasy, when the truth is the public doesn't like lousy screenplays.
Claiming this is an attempt at white-washing history implies you see this film as some sort of source for historical information, which is ridiculous. It isn't. It's fantasy adventure. Hence any historical argument is invalid. You wouldn't say this about Narnia or something.
@FinneousPJ I get what you're saying, really I do and I even agree with you to an extent. The problems actually comes when X fantasy adventure starts pulling extremely close to actual real life ideas and beliefs. Its considered white washing cultural ideas and beliefs even if the story was not trying to being historically. Unreal championship and unreal championship 2 while highly pulling from ancient Egypt in everything from names (every major character was named after an Egyptian god, hell the main character of the story's name is Anubis) and design of the world. Yet that can wasn't considered white washing or historically accurate (if us a futuristic shorter where the emperor is basically the pharaoh) because it stayed closer to culturally accurate in appearance.
Like above, the picture I posted as a joke, if universal actually made a epic fantasy using the Zulu empire, but had European actors wearing African attire,speaking in Zulu dialect, that would literally be white washing, even if the story itself has absolutely nothing to do with Zulu history, they are still manipulation and controlling the image of the the Zulu and how people see it.
Its the exact same way how black face and the minstrel show is still a stigma attached to black America, because they both were the public perception that people who had little to no interaction with black people, saw as the representation of blacks. It wasn't historically accurate or trying to be, it didn't portray any of the injustice towards blacks at that time; but it still controlled the perception of blacks that people had, it actually still do actually and this is not something limited to blacks, just using black a as a example.
Again you can white wash ideals, ideology, and perceptions, not just history in general.
Err, would you like to re-read the post you quoted, and then explain where I accused the film of "trying to white-wash history"?
My point was, In a fantasy film they don't need to look Egyptian, but they don't need to all look Euopean either.
It would actually have made more sense to cast chinese actors, since that is clearly the market the film is aimed at.
@Fardragon Would you like to re-read my post you were replying to, which specifically said "white-washing history". If you didn't refer to that, why on earth did you quote my post in the first place?
@FinneousPJ I get what you're saying, really I do and I even agree with you to an extent. They problems. Actually comes when X fantasy adventure starts pulling extremely close to actual real life ideas and beliefs.
I can see your point, but I don't think this movie is anywhere close to that.
Err, would you like to re-read the post you quoted, and then explain where I accused the film of "trying to white-wash history"?
My point was, In a fantasy film they don't need to look Egyptian, but they don't need to all look Euopean either.
It would actually have made more sense to cast chinese actors, since that is clearly the market the film is aimed at.
@Fardragon Would you like to re-read my post you were replying to, which specifically said "white-washing history". If you didn't refer to that, why on earth did you quote my post in the first place?
I quoted it because I was agreeing with it, in part. It is true that there was no need for an "Egyptian" cast in a fantasy film, even one with the word "Egypt" in the title. However, that does not excuse an (almost) all white cast. I'm certain there was no deliberate attempt at racism in casting this film, just a lack of thought, and I'm also certain the casting had nothing whatsoever to do with the film flopping.
@FinneousPJ For most people, skin tone falls under cultural representation, which his one reason the movie got bit so hard for that, but I won't focus on that fully. Remember mythology at one point was and in some cases still is religion. Its no different than how there is a on going battle about Jesus/Yeshau's skin tone and some people can't accept him as non Caucasian.
No different than how some people would've been annoyed if Baron Somadi in the old James bond movie would have been Caucasian, they would've been taking the head god of the Vodunn pantheon and separating him from the culture that worships vodunn. If they hadn't used Egyptian names, and Egyptian gods, and Egypt in general and just created a large fantastic land with its ow. Gods and goddesses like J.R Tolkien or George Lucas did, they wouldn't have been bombarded as hard as they did.
Also a movies job in general was to manipulate the viewers perception, especially before the era of classic Hollywood style of making movie. George Me lies' "the vanishing lady" was some of the earliest forms of messing with the viewers perception through film, and he was originally a illusionist and stage magician. German montage is another example.
I hate this phone
Also let me put this out there, I'm not insinuating thatanyone is racist because of this movie or its casting.
Comments
Historically Jesus was portrayed as white mainly by European artists who had no idea there was any other way a man could be. Just like Bible stories artistically depicted soldiers in medieval armor because artists didn't understand technology had changed in 2000 years; OR EVEN by artists who did know better but wanted their work to be more accessible to their audience.
If we're dealing with material more clearly historical or true to life more efforts should be made to be faithful to the source, including a look and manerisms that are fitting to the characters. Seeing John Wayne play Ghengis Kahn will be a distraction to most modern viewers; and that's probably good, it means viewers are a little more sophisticated, at least in that regard, than they were 50 years ago.
35 years ago I was directing a high school play and cast mother and son characters with actors from different races. Was I progressive or just being funny? I had no interest in social issues at the time, and I still don't. I made a casting decision based on what I thought would work best with the people available. And I can't bring myself to care about the issue at any more depth than that.
If you don't think it's a problem, that's certainly debatable. But it's definitely a thing that happens, that has happened in the past, that will probably happen again in the future. And in general, it's not a bad thing: it's one group of people adopting something from another group of people because they like it or because it resonates with them. It expands people's horizons, and that's awesome.
But the shadow of that sunny side is that more often than not, the appropriators don't pay due credit to the cultures they're stealing from. The Greeks said "These are our gods now, we created them so they're ours"; then the Romans said "These are our gods now, we created them so they're ours".
Europeans said "Jesus is white because we're white, so he's definitely white". And then hundreds of years later, in a white-dominant society, iconography in the western world claims that Jesus is white and the majority of people believe that claim, because of course he is, look at all the artwork!
And suddenly (or not so suddenly) we lose sight of the culture we've stolen from, and we wrongly assume that that culture is our enemy because their version of history and our version of history are not the same, and there's no way our version could be wrong.
That is cultural appropriation's effects, over a great span of time. In the micro scale, Gods of Egypt is a film made by one man who made a mistake in casting, and it resulted in a film that looks like a white-washing of history. And one film probably won't make a difference. And the director of that film should be forgiven for making an honest mistake--or at least, for making what certainly *looks* like an honest mistake. Casting for talent is definitely admirable; the unfortunate thing is that by casting all white actors, he inadvertently excluded a whole mass of talent that might have been just as effective and at least twice as appropriate for the subject matter.
It's not like some evil thing that has to be regulated and censored. But it's something that should be paid attention to--because we know (from history) what can happen if it's ignored.
Also, Universals new movie! Shaka Zulu!
I believe one of the reasons ITV's (British TV) Beowulf is so bad is the decision to set it in a fantasy "Shieldlands". A desision I suspect was made so the cast could be more representative of the ethnic mix of modern Britain, rather than early medievil Denmark.
But I maintain that poor script is a far greater sin than misjudged casting; and every bad fantasy film makes it less likely that further genre films will be made. Holywood gets the impression that the public don't like fantasy, when the truth is the public doesn't like lousy screenplays.
My point was, In a fantasy film they don't need to look Egyptian, but they don't need to all look Euopean either.
It would actually have made more sense to cast chinese actors, since that is clearly the market the film is aimed at.
I get what you're saying, really I do and I even agree with you to an extent. The problems actually comes when X fantasy adventure starts pulling extremely close to actual real life ideas and beliefs. Its considered white washing cultural ideas and beliefs even if the story was not trying to being historically. Unreal championship and unreal championship 2 while highly pulling from ancient Egypt in everything from names (every major character was named after an Egyptian god, hell the main character of the story's name is Anubis) and design of the world. Yet that can wasn't considered white washing or historically accurate (if us a futuristic shorter where the emperor is basically the pharaoh) because it stayed closer to culturally accurate in appearance.
Like above, the picture I posted as a joke, if universal actually made a epic fantasy using the Zulu empire, but had European actors wearing African attire,speaking in Zulu dialect, that would literally be white washing, even if the story itself has absolutely nothing to do with Zulu history, they are still manipulation and controlling the image of the the Zulu and how people see it.
Its the exact same way how black face and the minstrel show is still a stigma attached to black America, because they both were the public perception that people who had little to no interaction with black people, saw as the representation of blacks. It wasn't historically accurate or trying to be, it didn't portray any of the injustice towards blacks at that time; but it still controlled the perception of blacks that people had, it actually still do actually and this is not something limited to blacks, just using black a as a example.
Again you can white wash ideals, ideology, and perceptions, not just history in general.
For most people, skin tone falls under cultural representation, which his one reason the movie got bit so hard for that, but I won't focus on that fully. Remember mythology at one point was and in some cases still is religion. Its no different than how there is a on going battle about Jesus/Yeshau's skin tone and some people can't accept him as non Caucasian.
No different than how some people would've been annoyed if Baron Somadi in the old James bond movie would have been Caucasian, they would've been taking the head god of the Vodunn pantheon and separating him from the culture that worships vodunn. If they hadn't used Egyptian names, and Egyptian gods, and Egypt in general and just created a large fantastic land with its ow. Gods and goddesses like J.R Tolkien or George Lucas did, they wouldn't have been bombarded as hard as they did.
Also a movies job in general was to manipulate the viewers perception, especially before the era of classic Hollywood style of making movie. George Me lies' "the vanishing lady" was some of the earliest forms of messing with the viewers perception through film, and he was originally a illusionist and stage magician. German montage is another example.
I hate this phone
Also let me put this out there, I'm not insinuating thatanyone is racist because of this movie or its casting.