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White Egyptians |
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RE: White Egyptians |
11-18-2015, 06:10 AM
It's also possible that some people are reading into it a little too much. The movie is being created to appeal to a general audience. Has stuff been watered down? Definitely! Though that isn't necessarily a bad thing. Again, it isn't trying to be anything other than an action movie with some loose connections to Egyptian mythology.
It's also hard to discuss this sort of thing in-depth because, ultimately, this is a site devoted to FFXIV and role-play. Complex socio-political issues are often tricky to debate because there's a lot of people with different opinions who come from completely different backgrounds and boast conflicting views. There's countless examples of games, books and movies putting a creative spin on existing mythology and historical matters. Sometimes they reflect it as closely as possible. Other times liberties are taken - which, again, isn't necessarily a bad thing. The movie will make some people cringe. Many others, however, will likely enjoy it. |
RE: White Egyptians |
11-18-2015, 06:21 AM
(This post was last modified: 11-18-2015, 06:29 AM by Oli!.)
(11-18-2015, 06:10 AM)Graeham Wrote: It's also possible that some people are reading into it a little too much. The movie is being created to appeal to a general audience. Has stuff been watered down? Definitely! Though that isn't necessarily a bad thing. Again, it isn't trying to be anything other than an action movie with some loose connections to Egyptian mythology. It's not that tricky to debate, because we're actually doing it right now. Are people reading into it too much? That depends on who you ask. However, it's worth noting that the so-called "whitewashing" in Egypt is something that has been going on for decades, and is so effective that people think that this is what people in Egypt actually looked like. In fact, when my mother and her generation were growing up in the 50s and the 60s, they were literally being taught that Egypt was technically part of Europe because it bordered the Mediterranean. So Egypt in particular has a very long history of being forcefully tied to Caucasian Civilization. The more that this is perpetuated, the more people are going to believe it, and the longer that they're going to believe it. So believe it or not, it actually is a serious issue to a great deal of people, especially those that have an ethnic tie to that civilization, or who study it profusely. To put it into perspective, people are being told that the greatest culture in their ethnicity (save for perhaps Mali, though no one really learns about that empire anyway) isn't even theirs. It would be like someone saying for decades that "oh, that Roman empire? Naaaah man, that wasn't a European empire, that was us Native Americans! We built that, dude. Now go home and drink some Ovaltine, bud." To my knowledge, there is no other instance of the repeated erasure of a civilization in such a way, which is why this is an important issue. In fact, it could even be argued that the fact that you saw less of a problem with the "racial replacement" of one culture in a movie than with Egypt in the same circumstance is a testament to exactly how effective this is been (but it may also be confused for a personal attack, so I won't make it). This is something that's not only been done in movies, but in historical documentaries, textbooks, comics, and many, many other things. It's a problem. And it's certainly not "watering down." I personally challenge you to find an example of a game, book, or movie putting a creative spin on existing mythology or historical matters that takes extensive liberty with the replacing of a race by another that is not Caucasian. Single-person examples don't count; I want at least half a cast. As an afterthought, it's also worth noting that more and more movies these days make most of their bank from the International box office, so I'm not sure how much credence the idea of "pandering to a wide audience" really has. |
RE: White Egyptians |
11-18-2015, 06:25 AM
(This post was last modified: 11-18-2015, 06:52 AM by Hyakki.)
(11-18-2015, 04:49 AM)Oli! Wrote:(11-18-2015, 01:18 AM)Benedict Whiteraven Wrote: <-- Has degree with a focus on Egyptology. Â Where do I even begin . . . Ptolemaic dynasty???????? Romans???????????????? Though I suspect Mediterranean white does not count as white in this argument. (also not really relevant to the movie's setting, that trailer was a hot mess) (11-18-2015, 05:59 AM)Oli! Wrote: People with little to no ethnic connection to the culture and location used as the backdrop for the film are cast in the entirety of its important roles and most others, to the point where the actual races that have a tie to that location and mythology have virtually no presence, while speaking with out-of-place accents. The best you'll get is Egyptian nationals speaking Egyptian Arabic which is no more accurate to the film's setting than white actors speaking English. (Not that there's much of a setting. The plot seems to have little to nothing to do with ancient Egyptian mythology. The only thing "Egyptian" about the film is the aesthetic, but even that is an inaccurate mashup of time periods and artistic liberties) Did you hate The Odyssey for having a non-Greek cast that spoke with British accents? If so, I will fight you Ultimately, I don't know what's going on it's 2 am and I've been up well over 24 hours. I'm in agreement that the movie's pretty awful (especially the gratuitous abuse of cgi). If you want accuracy, go watch a documentary, read books or build a time machine or something idfk. EDIT: edits galore I'm gone now, have fun Oli. |
RE: White Egyptians |
11-18-2015, 06:46 AM
(This post was last modified: 11-18-2015, 06:54 AM by Oli!.)
(11-18-2015, 06:25 AM)Mamushi Wrote: Ptolemaic dynasty???????? ...Were not from Denmark or Scotland, and also looked nothing like the people in this movie from the art we have, historically. They actually hated the guts of those groups and thought they were a bunch of savages. Not to mention that as I said, these people have little to no connection to the mythology of the film; even if it were set during the rule of the first group or the occupation of the second, it must be noted that these people would not have been present in such large numbers as to entirely supplant the existing population to the point where there are no colored people. So I can't buy this as an explanation. And that's all without touching the fact that these people are playing the gods of this culture. A culture of colored people. (11-18-2015, 06:25 AM)Mamushi Wrote: The best you'll get is Egyptian nationals speaking Egyptian Arabic which is no more accurate to the film's setting than white actors speaking English. The best I'll get is a cast of people that are of the approximate race, visually (they don't even have to be, just at least make them look like it), that existed in that region at that time. What they looked like is not some sort of mystery, as there is plenty of sculpture and artwork that gives us a good idea; they were people of all skin-tones. There's also like a billion adaptations of the Odyssey so I have no idea which one you mean (though I also haven't seen any, so I guess it doesn't matter). I'd also argue that Greece and its culture doesn't have nearly as much of a problem with cultural supplanting as Egypt does. |
RE: White Egyptians |
11-18-2015, 07:10 AM
(This post was last modified: 11-18-2015, 07:11 AM by Oli!.)
(11-18-2015, 07:06 AM)Mamushi Wrote:(11-18-2015, 06:46 AM)Oli! Wrote: There's also like a billion adaptations of the Odyssey so I have no idea which one you mean (though I also haven't seen any, so I guess it doesn't matter). I'd also argue that Greece and its culture doesn't have nearly as much of a problem with cultural supplanting as Egypt does. It doesn't even have to be historically accurate, I just want people that are billed to be from a place / culture to look like they are from that place and / or belong to that culture. I don't really care about the actual history, and I think the aesthetic actually looks great. It's just that the cast they chose does a disservice by perpetuating a widely believed and damaging inaccuracy about this culture. Also, it's more than just the aesthetic and the names used; Set vs. Horus for the Throne of Everything is an actual Egyptian myth, complete with eye-gouging. This movie is comparable to a retelling of the Odyssey, in fact. |
RE: White Egyptians |
11-18-2015, 07:37 AM
(This post was last modified: 11-18-2015, 07:42 AM by Hyakki.)
(11-18-2015, 07:10 AM)Oli! Wrote: It doesn't even have to be historically accurate, I just want people that are billed to be from a place / culture to look like they are from that place and / or belong to that culture. I don't really care about the actual history, and I think the aesthetic actually looks great. It's just that the cast they chose does a disservice by perpetuating a widely believed and damaging inaccuracy about this culture. From what's shown in the trailer, it's a very poor retelling of the myth and I wouldn't say it's at all comparable. Choosing to forego historical accuracy is damaging to the culture, and changing the cast to one that "looks the part" doesn't help much. In fact, it would probably hurt the film because unfortunately, white is what sells, white is familiar, white is safe. |
RE: White Egyptians |
11-18-2015, 07:49 AM
(This post was last modified: 11-18-2015, 07:57 AM by Oli!.)
(11-18-2015, 07:37 AM)Mamushi Wrote: From what's shown in the trailer, it's a very poor retelling of the myth and I wouldn't say it's at all comparable. I'm not expecting much fantastic story from the retelling, but the fight scenes will probably be nice. Racial choices regarding what people go to see at the box office is a well-documented thing that I can't argue against, but it is still nonetheless reflective of the larger issue of cultural supplanting (I really hate the term "whitewashing" so I'm not going to use it), and is in fact something that feeds into it. The twisting of other cultures for the sake of the Caucasian moviegoing public is seen by many as a problem all its own. I can't fight the unfortunate reality that we live in, but I still maintain that narratively and culturally speaking, unless the movie stops at some point and the characters go "hey, we're white people in Egypt, I wonder what this means for us and our outlook," then nothing is added to the film by their casting. It therefore seems that there really isn't any reason for the casting to be visually accurate to the people that would have lived there. At the end of the day, there are two arguments that I want to get across. The first is that this is not accurate. As stupid as it may seem, there are many, many people out there that believe that the racial makeup in this film is an accurate portrayal of Ancient Egypt, and teach other people that this is so to this day. Casting of this caliber and cultural supplanting is even present in documentaries, as I said earlier, and believe it or not, museum exhibits. Unlike movies, these are things that are supposed to be presented as historical fact, and still manage to cast their reenactment portions and deliver their explanations in a similar manner to this movie. The second argument that I want to get across is that this casting isn't done for any sort of narrative or artistic favor. It's done for the sake of pulling an audience. Unless the movie stops to reflect on or reference its casting choice in at least a subtle way, then it's not making any sort of artistic statement, and as a result, there's no reason to use the "it's a work of fiction / art" excuse for the casting, unless the point is to show that white people look pretty superimposed on Ancient Egyptian Greenscreens. |
RE: White Egyptians |
11-18-2015, 08:52 AM
Duh. Egyptians were white. Vikings were black. Romans and Greeks were east asian. Get your facts straight.
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RE: White Egyptians |
11-18-2015, 09:02 AM
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RE: White Egyptians |
11-18-2015, 11:01 AM
I think the most important point that we are neglecting to discuss is that this movie just looks plane cheesy as hell. Not because of a white cast, but because it just looks stupid with a ridiculous abuse of CGI. When you use that much, why not just animate the whole thing?
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