DontBeThatGuy
Member
Slightly off topic here, but I'm looking at Scarlet's other movie, Lucy, and that shit made nearly 500mil worldwide? The fuck. It's no wonder execs thought they were onto something with her.
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Paramount Says Ghost In The Shell Flopped Because Of Whitewashing Controversy
- Thread starter KSweeley
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Gits might still do ok in China and Japan. It will make over 100 million. But 200? Long climb.
Dark Ninja
Member
Whitewashing is a good excuse to use for the movie failing. I don't think that was the reason GITS failure in the US though.
DangerMouse
Member
Especially without Cameron himself directing in the end, which might have sold some seats to his fans.
MoonsaultSlayer
Member
A movie like that, that actually "took risks" with its casting and being more faithful would have probably had great word of mouth and legs if it was done well enough, maybr even more strongly supported for taking those "risks".
(Hopefully studios realize there really is no risk. You risk more playing it safe and pleasing focus groups.)
(Hopefully studios realize there really is no risk. You risk more playing it safe and pleasing focus groups.)
ebullientprism
Member
I genuinely dont think the whitewashing thing bothers too many people out of the USA. If it flopped world wide, then chances are the movie wasnt very good or it wasnt a block buster film and they expected too much out of it.
Japanmanx3
Member
Kyle Davies said:
This quote is so corporate you can taste the starch...
Scarlett is a bankable actor star - when she's not playing an offensive role in a whitewashed movie.
Patrick Bateman
Member
And yet there's still no Black Widow solo film.
What was the last big Hollywood thing Jet was in, Expendables?
FinaruDensetsu
Member
I feel like at this point Donnie Yen maybe has the best chance. But I mean obviously he'll just get martial arts roles perpetuating the stereotype.
UnemployedVillain
Member
Exactly. The last "big" Asian star who wasnt solely known for their martial arts ability was John Cho, and before him Lucy Lui, then there were no others. It's pathetic
Yeah maybe. But I think of Kiss of The Dragon, The One. etc. Granted not huge budgets.
FinaruDensetsu
Member
Yeah as far as ones that are at least semi relevant in Hollywood and not just for the stereotypical role it's John Cho and I guess if we're just talking strictly comedy, it's Ken Jeong. But try as I might I can't really think of anything he's done recently except for Star Trek.
ClosingADoor
Member
This is one of the great mysteries to life. Makes zero sense not to have that made.
And even then he needed Kumar!
FinaruDensetsu
Member
I think Priyanka Chopra also has a good chance to break through but a lot of white people here in the US I doubt would even really know she's Asian or consider her as such.
lightskintwin
Banned
It's because nobody has ever tried to create a market for it.
Camper Van Beethoven
Banned
Paramount truly underestimated outrage culture in 2017. They should have consulted me I would have told them to fear keyboard warriors.
Even if white-washing wasn't really the reason for the bad reviews and tepid audience response, the fact that we have someone blaming that is good. This can be used to take them to task on other films in the future if they don't make an effort to move towards more inclusive casting. Especially when it makes logical sense, like having Japanese main cast beyond a single token dude in a film set in Japan.
Zoe
Member
They're not blaming the whitewashing though, they're blaming the controversy.
He's just blaming white-washing without accepting fault on the part of Paramount.
"Controversy over casting lead to poor reviews" is the same as saying that the casting lead to poor reviews, which is the same as saying that there's a problem with their casting. At least in the minds of the reviews and audience considering this film.
I am not saying that Paramount will be quick to put an end to white-washing, but each instance like this does give more ammo in the pushback against the practice. It's not like shareholders don't read entertainment news.
I dunno Paramount...if you're a fanboy parasite, I dunno if you can really get away with denigrating fanboys. Without them you wouldn't be making this terrible crap. So you're like a fanboy for fanboys.
and hey, its ifts just controversy, when things quiet down, maybe this movie's merits will finally get a chance to shin....yeah fuck that.
pay me 90K a year to make up excuses and I'll tell you a couple too.
and hey, its ifts just controversy, when things quiet down, maybe this movie's merits will finally get a chance to shin....yeah fuck that.
pay me 90K a year to make up excuses and I'll tell you a couple too.
Even without the controversy, I think the biggest reason this bombed was because people are kind of over it. The time for a Ghost in the Shell adaptation was sometime between the shitty Matrix sequels and before Æon Flux and Ultraviolet. The dark cyberpunk techno action movie thing just comes across as a dated turn-of-the-millenium cliche in 2017, even if the source material predates all that.
TGO
Hype Train conductor. Works harder than it steams.
It shouldn't have mattered.
Hopefully it doesn't bother Scarlett too much.
She atleast has Samuel Jackson to offer support as he went through the same thing.
Hopefully it doesn't bother Scarlett too much.
She atleast has Samuel Jackson to offer support as he went through the same thing.
This is true
Massive Duck. C.M.
Banned
Blame your consumer base for your bad movie brehs
So cyberpunk is just an off-limits thing from here on out? What?
They just need to change it to Blade Runner 2069.
ultracal31
You don't get to bring friends.
This, it's also why I think the Akira movie will most likely fail (outside of many, many issues we won't get into)
One thing I will say about Japan is they know their window for milking a franchise so despite the quality of it the attack on Titan movie came out when it's still relevant
If Hollywood was smarter they should fast track that one while it's still hot but no, gotta focus on Akira for some reason...
I think these studios need to get with the times and realize that star power isn't very relevant. Casting big names and assuming it'll be a hit has been shown to not work very well anymore. People don't give a shit that a new Will Smith movie is out, they care if it is good and worth their time. Look at Get Out and how big of a success it was, despite having barely any notable stars.
At the same time, doing an adaptation of something like this with a very narrow fanbase makes it understandable why they wanted what they had hoped would be a bankable star in the lead role.
At the same time, doing an adaptation of something like this with a very narrow fanbase makes it understandable why they wanted what they had hoped would be a bankable star in the lead role.
UnemployedVillain
Member
I'm going to strongly disagree with that. There's nothing stopping a cyberpunk movie from making it big. There was no boat that was missed or anything like that. If Christopher Nolan decided his next movie was in a cyberpunk setting I'd bet money it'd do well. GITS just looked too generic and 99% of what you read when googling it was controversy and bashing. I don't think I've seen a movie have such negative word of mouth, since...I dunno, Jewish people boycotting Passion of the Christ?
Even the Ridley Scott whitewashed Moses movie at least had the benefit of not also shitting on a franchise with very vocal fans (I didn't hear any Christian groups condemning its take on the story)
I think people overestimate how open to specific, niche aesthetics general audiences are. I guarantee there's a huge segment of moviegoers who saw the trailer, thought they'd seen it at least twice before, and wrote it off immediately.
GameAddict411
Member
Honestly, the movie flopped for other reasons. It was not a well made movie regardless. I think that using Asian actress would have made it do worse especially in Asia. I know that's weird, but whitewashing is not something that people really care about outside of the US.
Camper Van Beethoven
Banned
Bad movies make money all the time.
Quality rarely has anything to do with if Hollywood movies are successful. They're almost all trash. Lucy is complete shit.
And yet people keep going to see Marvel and Fast and The Furious Movies. Can't just disregard a whole genre because one movie didn't do a good job off it.
Why not write off all post apocalyptic movies? Road Warrior was good enough, let's stay home and not see Mad Mad Fury Road.
SuperStiltzkin
Member
Even Lucy had Morgan Freeman. Who was heavily marketed in the trailers for GitS? Pilou Asbaek? Michael Pitt? Takeshi Kitano?
I'm not saying "cyberpunk movies are totes over guys," but I do think there being a lot of flops in a certain genre will dampen enthusiasm for similar films, especially if like this one they also get a cold reception. If these movies aren't received well critically they just get lost in the noise. If Blade Runner doesn't suck I'm sure it'll be fine, but that's also unfair because it's pretty much the archetype.
I guarantee that in a decade people will be trying to figure out which shitty Matrix-y movie caused all the controversy, the one with Milla Jovovich, Charlize Theron, or Scarlett Johansson?
boiled goose
good with gravy
as not an anime fanboy:
The whitewashing for me fit a narrative of what the movie is and isn't. It communicated that it's a typical cash in adaptation, and not a real work of love.
Adaptations like Lotr didn't feel like cash ins.
The fact that the studio cares so much about star power and mass audience appeal almost means that it will automatically not be that great. It's a studio product. Not an artistic work.
The whitewashing for me fit a narrative of what the movie is and isn't. It communicated that it's a typical cash in adaptation, and not a real work of love.
Adaptations like Lotr didn't feel like cash ins.
The fact that the studio cares so much about star power and mass audience appeal almost means that it will automatically not be that great. It's a studio product. Not an artistic work.
Massive Duck. C.M.
Banned
What if anything does that have to do with what I said or this case
LordKasual
Banned
Went to see the movie with like 8 friends. For reference, we're all minorities of the Black and Asian flavor.
All of us were skeptical of the movie going in. Whitewashing was an obvious topic, but we none of us really cared that much because Scarlett. (!!) It was just something to do that day mostly.
Only two of us seemed to like the film. I was one of those two people. The main complaint of the movie was that it was boring and lacked action scenes, not that it was racially offensive or anything...which is funny, because those are the exact same reasons i never watched the Ghost in the Shell anime when it first aired over here.
I see that some people take issue with the fact the MC was "really japanese" except in a white woman's body. Which is about as much of a cop-out as Jurassic World actually acknowledging the fact that dinosaurs had feathers but nonetheless decided not to render them accurately. It feels shitty in hindsight but the actual reasoning behind it (within the confines of the movie) made sense to me.
I think the movie flopped simply because its concept wasn't for everyone. Just like the anime wasn't for everyone. The whitewashing controversy just served to sink it further, but I believe people are severely overshooting it they believe this movie would have done significantly better if the MCs were represented correctly. Ghost in the Shell is simply not that type of material.
All of us were skeptical of the movie going in. Whitewashing was an obvious topic, but we none of us really cared that much because Scarlett. (!!) It was just something to do that day mostly.
Only two of us seemed to like the film. I was one of those two people. The main complaint of the movie was that it was boring and lacked action scenes, not that it was racially offensive or anything...which is funny, because those are the exact same reasons i never watched the Ghost in the Shell anime when it first aired over here.
I see that some people take issue with the fact the MC was "really japanese" except in a white woman's body. Which is about as much of a cop-out as Jurassic World actually acknowledging the fact that dinosaurs had feathers but nonetheless decided not to render them accurately. It feels shitty in hindsight but the actual reasoning behind it (within the confines of the movie) made sense to me.
I think the movie flopped simply because its concept wasn't for everyone. Just like the anime wasn't for everyone. The whitewashing controversy just served to sink it further, but I believe people are severely overshooting it they believe this movie would have done significantly better if the MCs were represented correctly. Ghost in the Shell is simply not that type of material.
UnemployedVillain
Member
1 flop of a critically panned movie isn't going to do anything
SCULLIBUNDO
Banned
I know it probably didn't impact opening box office. But can we also not attribute the film's lack of success to the fact that it just wasn't very good?
WOM on this wouldn't have been super kind. Felt empty.
WOM on this wouldn't have been super kind. Felt empty.
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