Upon announcement of the cast in Rupert
Sanders’ upcoming American remake of Mamoru Oshii’s feature-length Japanese animé
Ghost in the Shell (1995) – and especially
with the release of a production shot depicting Scarlett Johansson as the lead
character Motoko Kusanagi (otherwise simply known as the Major) – the project
has become somewhat associated with the controversy of ‘whitewashing’ in
contemporary Hollywood. Casting a white woman in a live-action remake of a
Japanese property, as a character who is originally Japanese, has had some
audiences accusing the filmmakers and Johansson of “stealing” roles from Asian
actors. In order to amend the controversy, computer imagery was tested on Johansson’s
character to make her look Asian. In theory, one could argue that audiences are
concerned with the outward appearance of a character. However, this attempt
only exacerbated the issue, so it was abandoned.
Of course, this is not the first film to be
accused of whitewashing during this last decade. Most notorious among
adaptations of animations are James Wong’s Dragonball
Evolution (2009) and M. Night Shyamalan’s The Last Airbender (2010), respectively based on the Japanese animé
Dragon Ball and the American cartoon Avatar: The Last Airbender (which drew
influence from Eastern animation styles). It is not uncommon for audiences to sometimes
fail to perceive that most animé characters such as those depicted in Dragon Ball and its sequel series are
supposed to be or look Japanese, including those from outer space. Some don’t
know unless they’re told. To Dragonball
Evolution’s credit, it does cast Asian actors in the roles of Chi-Chi,
Master Roshi, Yamcha and Grandpa Gohan, but audiences mostly take issue with
the protagonist, the main character Goku, being played by a white actor (and depicted
as a teenager). Some argue that since Goku is an alien he can technically be
any race at all; that may be true, but at the same time one might ask if he can
be any race, why not make him Asian like he is originally instead of defaulting
to Caucasian?
The same has been argued about the Major in
Ghost in the Shell – she may be a
cyborg, but she is supposed to look Japanese; and if the setting of the film is
an “international world” as Producer Steven Paul described it, with actors from
several national and/or ethnic backgrounds, why does the ethnicity of the
protagonist default to white? One familiar with the different Ghost in the Shell media and official
resources will probably tell you that Kusanagi’s cyborg body may not resemble
her original and that she has no knowledge her identity before – in the 1995
animé, Kusanagi speculates that her memory could have been erased – implying
that the ethnicity of the character, in this case, is unimportant. But we’ll
get back to that later.
In The
Last Airbender, white actors portrayed Aang, Katara and Sokka (and an
Indian actor played Zuko) even though in the cartoon they were supposed to look
Chinese and Inuit (and Japanese) respectively. And in this instance we’re not
dealing with aliens or cyborgs; Avatar
is set in a world where these ethnicities make up the majority of the population
in their respective nations. Also mentioned as an example of whitewashing is Joe Wright's Pan (2015) where Rooney Mara plays Tiger Lily instead of a Native American actress. However this may be an unfair criticism since no one seems to address the context of the film; the entire tribe is multiethnic, the Chief (Tiger Lily's father) is played by Jack Charles, an Australian Aboriginal man, and it could be theorised with some merit that the so-called natives of Neverland in this version are runaways from enslavement in Blackbeard's mines. These examples, along with Alex Proyas’ Gods of Egypt (2016) – based on Ancient
Egyptian mythology – demonstrate a white protagonist or [most of the] main cast
in place of characters that were originally other ethnicities like Asian, Inuit
or Arabic, but where the supporting cast or background actors are more accurate
or, failing that, diverse. Some attribute the failure of these films to
‘whitewashing’ the main characters. While some may have been upset, this seems
like a dishonest conclusion; all these films were bad in their own right,
because of quality and narrative, regardless of race change – in the case of those
that are adaptations, because they misrepresented their source material also.
While American audiences’ reactions to the
casting of Scarlett Johansson in the lead role of Ghost in the Shell have either been perceptions of blatant and
offensive ‘whitewashing’ or attempts to analyse the reason behind the choice,
the major consensus among Japanese audiences seems to be accepting of Johansson
as the Major (as illustrated in the YouTube video ‘What Japanese Think of
Whitewashing (Ghost in the Shell, Death Note, Interview)’ by content creator
That Japanese Man Yuta), showing little surprise or objection, if any, to the
casting choice. The only issue taken in these interviews was that casting
directors should not exclude or reject actors because of their ethnicity, such
as was the case with Edward Zo’s audition for Adam Wingard’s upcoming remake of
Death Note. As commented in the
video, one can see a resemblance between Johansson and the character.
Initially, one may feel it would have been
more appropriate for an Asian actress to be cast as Kusanagi. However, one
recognises the reasoning behind the decision and the nature of casting in transnational
adaptations. According to animé reviewer Bennett White (a.k.a. BennettTheSage):
“Look, there’s been a ton of animé-based adaptations that have been
stuck in development hell for God-knows-how-long because everyone and their
mother has been scared to actually pull the trigger! James Cameron has been
battling for over a decade to get a Battle
Angel Alita film made, and Ghost in
the Shell took seven years before principle photography even began. Cowboy Bebop has certainly been milled
around too and Akira is infamous for
being green lit, only to have production stop four different times! And don’t
even get me started on Robotech!”
(Anime Abandon: Speed Racer (feat. NOSTALGIA CRITIC)).
Seven years! It’s understandable that the
creators, producers and/or studio would want to ensure the film would be as
successful as they could, hence why they cast Scarlett Johansson, one of the
biggest names in Hollywood. That’s not to say there aren’t any well-known Asian
actresses in Hollywood that would fit the part. Personally, one would suggest Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. star Ming-Na Wen
would make a good Kusanagi as she could easily pull off the character’s
temperament from the animé and seems suited for martial arts and gunfire in the
action genre. True, she is technically of Chinese descent and not Japanese, but
if an Australian, a New Zealand citizen and an American can be the main trio of
a musical set in Revolutionary France with no one kicking up a fuss, there
should be no problem with Wen playing the Major. However, the difference is
that Johansson is a bigger name and will draw a larger crowd, not excluding
those unfamiliar with the animé in the first place. Given the track record of failures
from previous live-action animé adaptations – such as the Wachowskis’ Speed Racer (2008) and the
aforementioned Dragonball Evolution –
and the time it has taken to get this remake into production, one can’t blame
them for trying to make Ghost in the
Shell as successful as possible.
Some audiences argue that the role should have
been given to an Asian or Japanese actress because Ghost in the Shell is part of Japanese culture. An interesting
thought, seeing as how Hollywood has made several remakes of Japanese titles in
the past – Godzilla, The Magnificent Seven (Seven Samurai), The Ring, The Grudge (Ju-On), Django and A Fistful of
Dollars (Yojimbo) – some of which
are infinitely more iconic, and no one has had a problem with the casting of
white people in the leading roles of any of these remakes. Is it because Motoko
Kusanagi is a Japanese name? Sadako Yamamura, the antagonist from Hideo
Nakata’s Ring (1998), is adapted in
Gore Verbinski’s version (2002) to Samara Morgan (Daveigh Chase). Sadako in the
South Korean version, Kim Dong-bin’s The
Ring Virus (1999), is called Park Eun-suh (Doona Bae). The name is not
sacred. It can be changed. And again, no one had a problem with it then, and
Japan has no problem with Johansson playing the Major now.
And it’s not simply a one-way street. Japan
has made adaptations of American films using Asian actors: Taro Otani’s Ghost: Mouichido Dakishimetai (2010), a
remake of Jerry Zucker’s iconic supernatural romance Ghost (1990), and Lee Sang-il’s Unforgiven
(2013), a remake of Clint Eastwood’s action movie of the same name (1992),
which funnily enough reversed the formula used in some Spaghetti Westerns to
turn an American western into a Japanese samurai movie. Their characters have
Asian names. Even if they don’t it doesn’t matter. Shinji Higuchi’s Attack on Titan (2015) is a two-part
live action Japanese remake of the popular animé series of the same name.
Despite both the source material and the adaptation being Japanese products,
all of the characters have/retain their European names, yet Japanese actors
portray them instead of white people. Is America or Europe in any way offended
by this? Nope!
Japan and America recognise each other’s
main racial demographics, and so would expect a player from that demographic to
play the part in a film from that country. The best way to look at the Ghost in the Shell remake is not as an
example of Hollywood’s shortcomings when it comes to race, but rather one of
several American remakes of a Japanese property, such as Gareth Edwards’ Godzilla (2014), John Sturges’ The Magnificent Seven (1960) or Gore
Verbinski’s The Ring, created through
fair acquisition of the rights from other studios. The decision to cast
Scarlett Johansson in the lead was not to snub Asian actresses; it was simply
so the film could appeal to as wide an audience as possible and to compensate
for the project’s prolonged time in “development hell”. Therefor the film, when released, should be critiqued on its narrative and cinematic merits, and acting. To boycott this film
based on Johansson’s involvement because she is white, as some may plan to do,
would be prejudiced.
No comments:
Post a Comment