Clint Eastwood has quickly become the tour de force of Hollywood, a director that any studio would love to have in the stable.  After Million Dollar Baby netted Best Picture and Best Director at the 2004 Academy Awards, Eastwood movies have become a staple at annual award shows. With how the Academy warms to biopic movies, this year’s Invictus will surely continue down the same path.

I remember reading Time for Kids in 1994 when Nelson Mandela was elected President of South Africa. It wasn’t until after seeing Invictus that I can begin to understand what Mandela has meant to South Africa and the rest of the world. By showing compassion and love to both enemies and friends, Mandela united a nation and region destroyed by decades of war, racial segregation, and apartheid.  Although only a brief portrayal of Mandela’s career, Invictus will allow American audiences to attach the deeds of Mandela with his name, which is already world renown

Invictus follows Mandela and South Africa’s preparation for the 1995 Rugby World Cup. Morgan Freeman (Mandela) is supported by Matt Damon in the role of Francois Pienaar, rugby captain for the South African Springboks. The film picks up the day Mandela assumes power, balancing a narrow fold by never becoming too political or too sports oriented. The plot focuses on how rugby contributed to Mandela’s diplomatic policy and how it contributed to stabilizing the divided nation.

Invictus, while not great, delivers a powerful message.  Eastwood certainly has amateur moments, such as shoving inspirational music down the throats of the audience. This was coupled with the fact that I found Morgan Freeman too identifiable. I was too often reminded of rough characters (like Scrap from Million Dollar Baby) that Freeman had portrayed in the past. This is a problem that biopic movies always face. Previous efforts like Ray, Walk the Line, Capote, and The Last King of Scotland were able to excel because they stared relatively unknown leads. Joaquin Phoenix (Johnny Cash in Walk the Line) and Forest Whitaker (Idi Amin in The Last King of Scotland) believably portrayed their roles because they hadn’t starred in blockbusters or epics like Wanted and The Shawshank Redemption. Even with this, Freeman portrayed Mandela well and deserves the early Oscar buzz.  Damon was relatively strong, often carrying the rest of the unknown, South African actors who portrayed the Springbok rugby team. Eastwood continues his use of local actors: aside from Damon and Mandela, the cast is primarily comprised of South African nationals.

Invictus brings to light the horrible racial prejudice that still exists in the 21st century. I couldn’t help but think of Bobby Kennedy in the final moments, a man who might have been as important as Mandela had his life not been taken by a nameless, selfish individual. Kennedy mentions in his speech, On The Mindless Menace of Violence, “but we can perhaps remember, if only for a time, that those who live with us are our brothers, that they share with us the same short moment of life; that they seek, as do we, nothing but the chance to live out their lives in purpose and in happiness, winning what satisfaction and fulfillment they can.”

As I was taking a bathroom break after the movie I was approached by a middle-aged black man who asked me, “How is my white brother doing tonight?” If but only for a moment in time, we both recognized what we shared. Later in the parking lot I was asked by another black man if I could spare change for his car that had run out of gas. He said, “My friend told me that I would never get money from a white man.” I gave him my last dollar. I wasn’t trying to be charitable.  I was trying to help a friend in need.

Nearly two months before his death, Robert Kennedy would ask one thing. He closed his speech saying, “surely, this bond of common faith, this bond of common goal, can begin to teach us something. Surely, we can learn, at least, to look at those around us as fellow men, and surely we can begin to work a little harder to bind up the wounds among us and to become in our own hearts brothers and countrymen once again.” Mandela has taught but a fragment of the globe to view enemies with kindness, compassion, and clemency. I can only hope that Invictus will inspire a new generation of leaders poised to eradicate the disease of prejudice.  The art of cinema has a global outreach and ability to inspire that humanitarian or awareness groups do not.  Eastwood is obviously drawing on this ability to share with the world a story of conquering racial prejudice entrenched in apartheid and uprooted by Mandela.

An infectious sense of hope accompanied the inauguration of President Barack Obama, surpassing even the optimism achieved upon his election. Across the nation his supporters utter the word “change” like a quiet devotion to the gods of Diversity and Equality. In many ways it seems logical that we would congratulate ourselves on at last overcoming long-standing and inexcusable hostilities, to elect not only a competent man, but an African American man. The election of our first black president has inherently changed our nation, but is this triumph everything we believe it to be?

The day after Obama was elected, one of my professors warned that despite the triumph of the day, we must be careful not to forget that racism wasn’t dead, that minorities still faced many problems including the stereotypes used to depict them in our media. Despite their comments, I was not about to diminish my optimism for the diverse storytelling I perceived to have opened up in television and movies. Now that the people of the United States had so decisively elected an African American to the office of president, wouldn’t they also be ready to embrace a broader range of characters in their entertainment? On December 9^th, upon reading a short article in Entertainment Weekly, I realized my optimism had been naïveté.

“I think it’s one of those things where I pull my hair up, shave the sides, and I definitely need a tan,” said Jackson Rathbone.

According to the article, famous director M. Night Shyamalan had begun casting his live-action adaptation of the highly acclaimed and widely viewed Nickelodeon animated series, Avatar: The Last Airbender. First, anyone unfamiliar with the show needs to understand what made it so amazing during its three-season run. Unlike other Nickelodeon staples like Spongebob Squarepants, Avatar is more than a cartoon. Using Asian mythologies, traditions, architecture, martial arts practices and philosophies, the creators of Avatar, Bryan Konietzko and Michael Dante DiMartino, developed a rich, diverse world filled with well-rounded characters and all the gray area between good and evil we find so compelling in our own world.

Essential to the story is how this world is divided between the four nations (the Fire Nation, Earth Kingdom, Water Tribes and Air Nomads) and balanced by the one person who can master the bending arts associated with each of these peoples, the Avatar. The series thus follows twelve-year-old Aang, the last remaining Airbender and long-thought-vanished Avatar, who must learn all four bending arts and put an end to the one hundred year war waged against the other societies by the Fire Nation. Helping him along his journey is the Waterbender Katara and her warrior brother Sokka, as well as blind Earthbender Toph Bei Fong. Throughout much of the series Aang is hunted by the banished and scarred Prince Zuko of the Fire Nation, who must capture the Avatar to redeem his honor. Over the course of the three seasons Aang masters the elements, Katara overcomes cultural sexism, and Zuko transforms from angst-ridden anger glutton to the understanding and wise new ruler of the Fire Nation.

With all this great material at the ready, what could be so devastating about the EW article on Shyamalan’s film adaptation? Despite clear cultural markers including skin color (Katara and Sokka are dark-skinned and therefore long presumed by fans to be Inuit), dress (if the Kyoshi Warriors of the Earth Kingdom don’t look like female Samurai with Geisha make-up, I’ll eat my hat) and other signifiers (such as the in-world use of classical Chinese calligraphy), Shyamalan cast all of his main characters with Caucasian actors.

Upon the printing of the news of this decision, the Internet was aflame with fan responses. What happened to the diversity of the series, the beauty of a non-western mythology, the careful attention given to respectfully incorporating elements of cultures far different then those dominating ours in the U.S.? The fans demanded an answer. Instantly a letter-writing campaign protesting the cast was started, message boards were assaulted and blogs (often emotional tirades, sometimes forceful, analytical rebukes) flooded the web. By January, Entertainment Weekly ran a second short article on the casting, noting the extreme and almost entirely disapproving response of fans. According to the EW article, “Paramount declined comment, other than to say that casting isn’t complete.”

However, as of late January, pop star Jesse McCartney, cast to play Prince Zuko, was gushing to radio hosts about his killer Kung Fu workouts for the film. Also according to him the show was originally an explosive hit in Asia before coming to the United States (point in fact: The series is based on Asian culture but was conceived, written, often storyboarded and originally aired in the United States before gaining international attention).

This casting decision goes beyond just the destruction of a beloved franchise however, and that is why it is worth fighting. Hollywood, so often accused of being liberal in its tastes but in truth highly conservative in less noticeable more profit guaranteeing ways, has a long history of problems in its depictions of minorities. Not only has the problem been a tendency to characterize non-white characters as either violent outsiders or unintelligent loafers, but a habit of replacing dominant and positively portrayed minority characters with white ones. This is nothing new to either the African American or the Asian communities. For years insult has been added to injury when minority characters were not simply adapted for white performers, but instead white performers portrayed these characters in blackface or yellowface.

Over time, blackface has fortunately become highly taboo to the point that its practice and those performing it have been sharply rebuked by films like Spike Lee’s Bamboozled and more recently Tropic Thunder. While the discontinuation of the absurd practice of blackface has been a great step forward, this of course does not solve the problem. Even after blackface fell into disfavor, yellowface continued to be used. Over the years many of our most favored celebrities have taped their eyelids, worn false teeth and yellowed their skin to play “Asian” characters, including: Boris Karloff, Katherine Hepburn, Agnes Moorehead, Fred Astaire, John Wayne, Yul Bryner, Marlon Brando, Mickey Rooney, Shirley MacLaine, Alec Guinness, Peter Sellers, Jerry Lewis, and Linda Hunt. More recent actors have participated in this distasteful practice, although done with the claim it serves as a critique, or as part of a much different joke.

Unfortunately as the current casting stands, we have the potential to have not only a situation where non-white characters are replaced with white actors, but use of make-up and costuming easily defined as brownface and yellowface has already been openly discussed. In an interview with MTV.com Jackson Rathbone, best known for playing Jasper in the film Twilight and currently signed on to play Sokka of the Southern Water Tribe, was quoted as having this response to the controversy, “I think it’s one of those things where I pull my hair up, shave the sides, and I definitely need a tan.” Clearly Rathbone has missed the point. I find this to be another moment to bring up Tropic Thunder, as it is this kind of thoughtless, role/money-grubbing behavior that the film so successfully satirizes. Apparently the execs at Paramount and the casting director didn’t bother seeing it.

In the past few years several other films have been guilty of the same whitewashed casting as The Last Airbender, films such as Speedracer, Forbidden Kingdom, Eathsea, and Dragonball Evolution (and I would like to point out that all three that have been released so far have failed terribly). Eathsea in particular received a great deal of criticism, as the successful book series it was based on featured a dark-skinned hero but the film cast yet another blonde-haired, blue-eyed pretty boy (i.e. Shawn Ashmore of X-Men fame) to play its protagonist. The difference here is that while Earthsea had devoted fans, Avatar has more and better informed/prepared fans. That is why protesting the disrespectful casting of The Last Airbender serves a purpose greater than releasing frustrations about the destruction of a great franchise: Because if we can force Paramount to recast this film, or cause the film to fail at the box office if it is not recast, it would send the message to Hollywood that we the fans and filmgoers are not only ready for, but are demanding entertainment populated by characters as diverse as we are.

We have already proven our point in politics, that we want the people who are most qualified and who represent us as a society, a society made up of all kinds of colors, religions, backgrounds and values. Now it is time Hollywood heard us as well.

If you would like more information about how you can fight the all-white casting of The Last Airbender as well as links to other great articles and blogs on this subject, visit: www.aang-aint-white.livejournal.com

By Thomas Gilchrist

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: this was not a race election.

The press and public have made a big deal out of the fact that Barack Obama is of African descent.  My Uncle made calls on behalf of the Obama campaign leading up to the election. One elderly woman said “It’s time to put an end to racism.” The actual choice of  Barack Obama as President-Elect did not put an end to anything, though hopefully his presidency will.

If you still judge people by the color of their skin, (… and not the “content of their character”) you are living in the past, and have been for about forty years or so.  You are also a bigot, and should consider further education, or head-out-of-your-ass removal surgery in the near future.

President Obama's grandfather, Stanley Dunham, mother, Ann Dunham, and half-sister, Maya Soetoro-Ng

President Obama’s grandfather, Stanley Dunham, mother, Ann Dunham, and half-sister, Maya Soetoro-NgBarack Obama’s election to President is not about the African-American race overcoming history and society because the actual problems African-Americans often need to overcome were never experienced by President Obama.  True, his father was an African immigrant from Kenya, but even that doesn’t qualify his father for the problems over which the descents of slaves are in need of overcoming.

President Obama was, by all accounts, raised white.  In talking about African Americans, and “whites,” what we are really talking about is stereotypes, so that when people say “African American” and “overcome,” other people have a general idea what they are talking about.

Being raised in Hawaii by two white middle-class parents, receiving a good and successful education, and attending both Columbia and Harvard, is not generally considered prototypical for an African American overcoming odds.

Here’s what can often happen in low-income African American communities where there is overcoming to be done, like the African American community in Kalamazoo, MI.

The father leaves; this is nothing new to Mr. Obama.  Only in the world of most abandoned African American children, an absent father does not mean you get raised by two nice white middle-classers.

Instead, what can often happen is this:

The father leaves, only to return from time to time to visit the mother.  He is not very responsible about his child support checks.  The mother, left not only to raise one child, but  three along with two cousins, works sixty-hour weeks at a combination of Burger King, Ernie’s Laundrorama, and as a cashier at the neighborhood gas station.  Her annual income is $15,000, before taxes.  Almost all of this goes into living expenses for not just her and her children, but her aunt, her husband’s mother, and another aunt, Cleo.  She thanks God for finding qualified employment, as she never graduated from high school.

Seeing as the mother is holding down three minimum-wage jobs to support her family, the five kids are raised primarily by their Great Aunt Cleo and their Grandmother.

The family of nine rents two rooms with access to a kitchen and a bathroom for $400/mo.  The mother’s disposable income is $650/ mo., so only $250 a month is left to pay for everything the family of nine will need for thirty days.  They have to pay for their utilities, and during harsh Kalamazoo winters, they are often unable to afford adequate heat.  The average temperature inside their house can get down to 45 degrees.

The three kids and the two cousins go to a underfunded public school where almost everyone comes from the same demographic: low-income, single-parent, African American.  The eldest, Keyshawn, a fifth-grader, gets expelled from school for pushing Dyonte down a flight of stairs because Dyonte was making fun of Keyshawn’s cousin for wearing ratty clothes to school.  Keyshawn will eventually wind up in Juvy for repeated minor acts of violence, and, at the age of 23, prison, for the selling of marijuana and Crack-Cocaine.

The youngest child, Emily, will be the only member of the family to graduate high school.  She will then go on to graduate from Community College, upon which she will work as a desk clerk in a local law office, making $29,000 per year.

The mother, Suzanne, becomes an habitual drug user upon loosing two of her jobs to a down-turned economy.  The Grandmother and Great Aunt Cleo die at the ages of 73 and 67, respectfully.  The father, Tony, winds up in prison for stealing a car and driving it across state lines. The middle child, Shaquille, quits school at the age of sixteen to work in an auto body shop like his dad did. The two cousins are rumored to be around Kalamazoo, and both have served short sentences for misdemeanors.  The other aunt leaves once all the kids are in middle school, and now lives with family in Tennessee.

Barack Obama did overcome prejudice, which shows there are at least fewer bigots in our country than there used to be.  Slavery encompasses this world’s darkest moments, and citizens of the United States of America were to blame for part of the trade.  Barack Obama’s direct decedents, however, were not brought to this country in ball and chain, forced to work and faced with death.

Many African Americans struggling to make a living, hoping their kids will break out of the vicious cycle that is race-correlated poverty, only to see time and again Keyshawns winding up in prison and Shaquilles quitting school, did, in fact, come from these origins.

I am glad Barack Obama is President, and should the color of his skin have cost him the election, I would have been ashamed for our country.  What interests me is not WASPs overcoming prejudices relating to Obama’s African heritage, but their overcoming of prejudice towards something I’ve found to be much more polarizing in recent years: his Muslim heritage.