Is Ridley Scott's Biblical Epic Exodus Whitewashing Ancient Egypt?

[Reaper195]

Changed my mind about what I was going to comment can't be bothered with the arguments.

Did you have a few hundred words written out and then go "Nah. Fuck it." ? That happens to me too often on this site.

 

[Atmos Duality]

Oh boy, this shit again..
It's like crap about Idris Elba and Nick Fury's casting, only in reverse because it's white this time.
Looking through the topic, it appears that everyone has already made up their mind, so actually addressing the bugbear would just be pointless and redundant.

So there's only two points I'm really taking away from this mess:

1) Until the invisible "social justice scales" are balanced, even the simplest notion of a performer portraying someone they aren't (you know, this thing called "acting") will always be questioned when race is involved, because racism is a big ol' sore spot. Especially for Hollywood.

If they cast Chow Yun Fat as Pharaoh I'd wager it would generate less bile than this.

2) The most relevant part of this whole article is that jumping onto any "progressive" bandwagon (racist/sexist/etc) is an easy way to drive up one's relevance, and corresponding ad-clicks.

Something Mr. Chipman has a bit of history doing.
(I remember his love letters to Sarkeesian last year and his laughable ignorance of the term "academic")

 

[bjj hero]

I sent a link of the trailer to my Egyptian friend. I didn't say anything but, hey look they're doing an Exodus movie.

The first thing she said to me was "Why is Christian Bale playing Moses?" Then she said "Why is Sigourney Weaver playing an ancient Egyptian queen?" Then I told her Ramses is being played by an Australian dude with spray tan.

I was laughing so hard, I had tears in my eyes. Of course, she didn't think it was as funny as I thought it was.

It's just hilarious that in the year 2014, with the internet and the whole world watching, Hollywood still tries to pull this crap.

And the Black/middle eastern/African actors who suit the part and work super hard? No, well replace them with random white guys because replacing everyone in the story of colour with white people is less racist.


Turns out ancient Egypt looks like middle America with more make up and less Jesus.

Awesome.

Err so these two jewish man are too white to Moses

The most likely candidate for the Pharaoh in when Exodus possibly happened was Ramses the great. This is him

Note the red hair. Its your contention that a man of european origin is too white to play a man with red hair.

No. Its just clear that all of the Egyptians have to be played by white Americans or those with accents that can pass for one. No egyptian actor, or even an actor from the surrounding region was suitable.

 

[Lono Shrugged]

This is not an article about a movie. This is an article about social issues using the movie as a framing device.

I do not care that they are not using racially "accurate" actors for the film. Because it's a fucking film and not a political statement. It's not reality. And you can have a go about how they should have cast 'appropriately' but I really don't care. It's fiction, not the real world and they can cast whoever they want in the film. A film will never be accurate.

If Bob even looked over Scott's career, movies and casting history he would realise how much shit he is talking. Look at who he got to play Saladin in Kingdom of Heaven or the cast of Black Hawk Down and Body Of Lies. You may not recognise them, but some of those people are huge in their respective countries. He has given several non white actors their big breaks in the west. If the guy wants to make an Egypt movie with actors that draw a crowd and he respects, he is well entitled to. An artist must follow their own vision and not some ham handed politically correct one. Didn't hear Bob mention any of this in Noah...

All this article will do is rile up people and cause pointless arguments. It's tabloid movie journalism and I am sorry I came back and gave Bob another chance.

 

[Albino Boo]

No. Its just clear that all of the Egyptians have to be played by white Americans or those with accents that can pass for one. No egyptian actor, or even an actor from the surrounding region was suitable.

Oh for god sake, in the name of anti racism you are engaging in racial stereotyping as to what you think Egyptians looked like 3000 years ago. The Arabs did not reach Egypt until the 6th century AD and since then the country has become LESS racially diverse. The previous 3000 years was filled with large scale population movements to and from Egypt, those stopped under Arab rule. The mediterranean basin was cut if half by the muslim conquest that ended 1000s of years of population movements. The only new populations came as slaves from both sub saharan africa and europe, but compared to the numbers that used move in and out Egypt it was very small. The number Christian slaves taken from europe over the 7th-17th centuries is estimated to be in the region of 3 million but that was spread out over the entire middle east. Fundamentally what the population of Egypt looks like today is not the same as what it looked like in 1100 BC.

 

[MrBaskerville]

I don't recognize the actor playing Ramses, but he looks Middle Eastern too me. Hopefully, Scott learned his mistake from Prometheus and kept Damon Lindelof the hell away from the script for this one.
Also, Bob, no mention of Dreamworks' Prince of Egypt? Come on!

I think it's safe to assume that Lindelof is far away from this, they've basically only worked together that one time, obviously because it was right up Lindelofs alley. I'm expecting great things for this one, Scott usually does well with these kinda of grand epic movies, but it's probably going to be a hell of a lot better in the directors cut version.

 

[bjj hero]

No. Its just clear that all of the Egyptians have to be played by white Americans or those with accents that can pass for one. No egyptian actor, or even an actor from the surrounding region was suitable.

Oh for god sake, in the name of anti racism you are engaging in racial stereotyping as to what you think Egyptians looked like 3000 years ago. The Arabs did not reach Egypt until the 6th century AD and since then the country has become LESS racially diverse. The previous 3000 years was filled with large scale population movements to and from Egypt, those stopped under Arab rule. The mediterranean basin was cut if half by the muslim conquest that ended 1000s of years of population movements. The only new populations came as slaves from both sub saharan africa and europe, but compared to the numbers that used move in and out Egypt it was very small. The number Christian slaves taken from europe over the 7th-17th centuries is estimated to be in the region of 3 million but that was spread out over the entire middle east. Fundamentally what the population of Egypt looks like today is not the same as what it looked like in 1100 BC.

So clearly only white Americans will do.

 

[Kameburger]

I...　don't really know what to say at this point... Probably? I donno, what can you really say at this point besides, well, this is how this stuff works, and it would be nice if it didn't work that way, but it does. I mean ok even if we did say, well the demographics in America have changes, it still doesn't change the fact that Asia isn't going to go see it whether it's all white actors because if they aren't white than it isn't Hollywood there.

 

[Albino Boo]

No. Its just clear that all of the Egyptians have to be played by white Americans or those with accents that can pass for one. No egyptian actor, or even an actor from the surrounding region was suitable.

Oh for god sake, in the name of anti racism you are engaging in racial stereotyping as to what you think Egyptians looked like 3000 years ago. The Arabs did not reach Egypt until the 6th century AD and since then the country has become LESS racially diverse. The previous 3000 years was filled with large scale population movements to and from Egypt, those stopped under Arab rule. The mediterranean basin was cut if half by the muslim conquest that ended 1000s of years of population movements. The only new populations came as slaves from both sub saharan africa and europe, but compared to the numbers that used move in and out Egypt it was very small. The number Christian slaves taken from europe over the 7th-17th centuries is estimated to be in the region of 3 million but that was spread out over the entire middle east. Fundamentally what the population of Egypt looks like today is not the same as what it looked like in 1100 BC.

So clearly only white Americans will do.

I'm going to put this very simply for you. The current population of Egypt did not like like what the population did 3000 years ago. Furthermore you are saying you can only be cast someone as playing jewish if they look like your idea of some middle eastern. By your reckoning virtually every Jewish actor and actress in hollywood couldn't play someone who is Jewish in this film for being insufficiently middle eastern. What do they have to look like to meet your approval, have breads and say oy vey every other word. Typical social justice warrior carrying racial stereotyping in the name of social justice.

 

[Gorrath]

I've always been confused how people can swap races out to change the context of any argument to suit them. What the hell is "white" anyway? I ask because the definition of what "white" is seems to change based on how anyone wants to make something look. Hispanic guy kills black kid? He's white. White guy kills Hispanic guy? He's Hispanic, because "white guy kills white guy" doesn't sell stories. White actor plays Jewish character? White washing! Jewish actor plays Egyptian character? White washing! Keanu's 1/4 Asian and plays an Asian character? White washing!

I'm not just trying to be obtuse, I'm honestly confused as to why people find it necessary to re-brand the players in any situation "White" or "Not-white" seemingly based on how much indignation they can create. This seems especially true when someone is mixed race or when people use race/ethnicity interchangeably. I'm sympathetic to the idea that choosing actors who's race/ethnicity fits the role, but this is contextual of course.

Bob already provided an answer for this http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/the-big-picture/3183-Skin-Deep
But the long and the short of is the legacy of slavery and institutionalized racism makes it an acceptable double standard.

And I will always argue that Bob is dead wrong. Replacing institutionalized racism with a racist double standard does not serve the abolishment of racism. The existence of a legacy of racism, or even racism currently present in a system, should not lead to the simple adoption of new racism to combat the old. We should attempt to abolish racism from every system as much as we can, not indulge in more of it. Combating any injustice is a worthy cause, but engaging in injustice to do it only serves to make us hypocrites.

 

[Verlander]

Always fun to see people who know nothing about a given subject more than what a cursory google search can muster arguing their case because of opinions.

The history of Egypt is long and complicated, as Bob said. It just doesn't look like they made any effort to cast more accurately with the information at hand. Then again, it's a religious (old testament to boot) film being made for the American audiences. Of course they want white.

 

[Hot Madness]

One important point that Bob doesn't address (at least, not directly), is that the Egyptian Emperors were pretty much white. The ones we mostly associate with ancient Egypt is the Ptolemaic dynasty, named after Ptolemy I, a Macedonian general of Alexander the Great; so, while they are geographically Africans, ethnically, the higher circles were Greek descendants. Combine that with a lot of inbreeding happening in those years (with brothers getting married and having children considered mostly natural within royalty), and we can infer that those traits were passed on all the way down to Cleopatra.

So, this is less an example of Hollywood whitewashing an African Empire's family, and more about they actually getting it right, at least in this case.

Of course, that is mostly about the Pharaoh and his family... The rest of Egypt was as racially diverse as it could be expected of an Empire near the intersection of many other ethnically diverse empires.

Except that Rameses II reigned almost a thousand years prior to Ptolomy I and the Ptolomic dynasty was very much the last pharonic dynasty of Egypt. So no, the Egyptian pharaohs were not "white" until the very end of three thousand years of pharonic rule.

 

[V4Viewtiful]

I'm not surprised, this is what happens all the time and any ethnic organisation with any kind of power will let it slid just like the audience,

The sphinx has been defaced twice it seems.

The Prince of Egypt may never be topped... In fact I'm goig to watch it now. It had singing!

You don't even need a lot of black people, there's surely enough brown people out there that could facilitate some of these roles but then that doesn't bring in the punters, does it? Which is the main reason I suspect, star power.

This is a statue of the Pharaoh Hatshepsut, who happened to be a woman.

That doesn't count, many cultures women took the male look to enforce there authority, plus there are some manly looking women out there she may have just steered into the skid

i like how people are ignoring the actual members of "the white actors" include the likes of a certain thesp held in high regard for playing Gahndi and a long time Ridley Scott collaborator.

Actually, Ben Kingsley is of Indian decent which is why he got quite a bit of leeway

 

[V4Viewtiful]

I've always been confused how people can swap races out to change the context of any argument to suit them. What the hell is "white" anyway? I ask because the definition of what "white" is seems to change based on how anyone wants to make something look. Hispanic guy kills black kid? He's white. White guy kills Hispanic guy? He's Hispanic, because "white guy kills white guy" doesn't sell stories. White actor plays Jewish character? White washing! Jewish actor plays Egyptian character? White washing! Keanu's 1/4 Asian and plays an Asian character? White washing!

That argument is different when you are black, your all the same

But seriously, this is the sort of thing that happened to Zimmerman the hispanic dude that shot that kid.

To answer the question seriously though, the term is usually derived from the early humans that originated from the caucus mountains as a general term for european. Not including migration from the east or north africa which contributed to the latin nation, (spain, italy etc.).

It's similar to the whole "Black Label" for Black people if you're mixed you're considered black (not going into slavery) if you had a black mother usually, culture for a while favours fairer skin and for a while the darker you where the harder you had it and that was part of the whole "how black are you" thing.

I'm not going into to much detail and am speaking in general terms just because I don't want to write an essay, we all know it's more complex than this.

 

[New Frontiersman]

Edit: Posted in wrong forum, sorry.

Edit: Since I posted here already anyway, might as well contribute something to the discussion:
While his doesn't really seem like the kind of movie I would go out of my way to go see, it still seems like they made some questionable casting decisions. I wonder if they think about these kinds of issues when they're doing the casting or if they just try to get the biggest actors possible without putting much thought towards race?

 

[Albino Boo]

This is a statue of the Pharaoh Hatshepsut, who happened to be a woman.

That doesn't count, many cultures women took the male look to enforce there authority, plus there are some manly looking women out there she may have just steered into the skid

Lets not be selective in the quoting shall we.

[ Ancient Egyptian statues followed very strict conventions and there is very little variation in appearance for most of 2000 years of its existence. Take this statue

This is a statue of the Pharaoh Hatshepsut, who happened to be a woman.

I was using Hatshepsut as an example of the that representation of the image of pharaoh is unchanging regardless of the pharaoh
This is a statue of Hatshepsut successor Tuthmosis III

Virtually identical

Amenhotep III

Seti II


To the Egyptians Pharaoh was a living god and came under the same conventions that covered depicting other gods.

 

[Gorrath]

I've always been confused how people can swap races out to change the context of any argument to suit them. What the hell is "white" anyway? I ask because the definition of what "white" is seems to change based on how anyone wants to make something look. Hispanic guy kills black kid? He's white. White guy kills Hispanic guy? He's Hispanic, because "white guy kills white guy" doesn't sell stories. White actor plays Jewish character? White washing! Jewish actor plays Egyptian character? White washing! Keanu's 1/4 Asian and plays an Asian character? White washing!

That argument is different when you are black, your all the same

But seriously, this is the sort of thing that happened to Zimmerman the hispanic dude that shot that kid.

To answer the question seriously though, the term is usually derived from the early humans that originated from the caucus mountains as a general term for european. Not including migration from the east or north africa which contributed to the latin nation, (spain, italy etc.).

It's similar to the whole "Black Label" for Black people if you're mixed you're considered black (not going into slavery) if you had a black mother usually, culture for a while favours fairer skin and for a while the darker you where the harder you had it and that was part of the whole "how black are you" thing.

I'm not going into to much detail and am speaking in general terms just because I don't want to write an essay, we all know it's more complex than this.

Right, I get the academic definition of white (to a point) but I meant "What is white?" in the context of these kinds of discussions. It seems to me white is a nebulous term used to create a narrative to prop up a political point of view than it is a useful term regarding people or ethnicity (again, in the context of these types of discussions.)

People endlessly claimed that Zimmerman was "white", which may be a perfectly acceptable description depending on what you mean by it. But I am willing to bet my life's savings that had a Caucasian person shot and killed Zimmerman, many of those self-same people would have been calling Zimmerman "Hispanic" instead. And of course, many of the people constantly correcting the first group might well have flipped sides too. It all depends on how heavily anyone is trying to leverage/de-leverage racism as part of their argument.

This phenomenon happens with all sorts of ethnicities too. Jews would not be Caucasian, but are they white? Depends on the context of the argument. How about Hispanics, Latinos? I'm not blind to the issues in Hollywood with the way they tend to cast roles, especially for leads, but we don't seem to get anywhere in these discussions because so many people change what they mean by "white" depending on whether it suits their argument or not. Not that I'm helping, I admit, by simply fuming about it.

 

[Gorrath]

Edit: Posted in wrong forum, sorry.

Edit: Since I posted here already anyway, might as well contribute something to the discussion:
While his doesn't really seem like the kind of movie I would go out of my way to go see, it still seems like they made some questionable casting decisions. I wonder if they think about these kinds of issues when they're doing the casting or if they just try to get the biggest actors possible without putting much thought towards race?

Given the way Hollywood's machinery works, they don't tend to bother too much with the race/ethnicity of the actors unless it is powerfully relevant. One would not cast Keanu Reeves as Martin Luther King jr, so in that case race would obviously play a major factor. But for a Biblical story where so many people don't have a clue what the people of that region actually look like, it becomes much more important to get star power on board and not care so much about having them look "ethnic enough." It's all contextual. I tend to fall into the camp that cares more about whether an actor is suited to play a certain character than I do about whether the actor's parents were of the correct ethnicity/race.

I do think the attitude of studio execs thinking that lead characters need to be white has to change, for the betterment of the industry, art and society as a whole. I do not think badgering a specific director/movie/actor about whether they meet nebulously defined racial/ethnic standards for the casting of a specific role is the way to get there though.