Discussion Diversity In the New Saga [See OP Warning]

Don't...waitresses (and *waiters* for that matter) usually have less than two minutes of screentime in a movie if they're not one of the leads? And generally don't really serve much significant plot purpose? And do they have to, if they're not one of the story's protagonists?

As far as Blunt's character, she pretty clearly corrects her mistakes in the alt-timeline by the movie's conclusion. And yeah, she's "saved" in a direct sense, but she also basically does equal part "saving" of her own, in fixing the prior mistakes and ensuring the kid doesn't go all omnipotent mafia don in the new timeline.

 

It still leaves much to be desired. I just don't understand what people mean when they say that Rian Johnson is a "progressive" force in Hollywood. He's not. Joker was more anti-capitalist than Rian Johnson's "anti-capitalist" message, which smacked more of nihilism and "both sides" fallacy than being truly progressive or leftist or what have you. Other than that, Rian Johnson didn't give Finn or Rose anything to really do (aside from their subplot being downright boring) and so it's hard to take those characters seriously, in my honest opinion.

But regardless, I think we should stop talking about the guy before we risk derailing the thread.

While it isn't exactly the diversity we're talking about, I wouldn't mind more characters with accents, like Mads Mikkelsens'. Besides, it only makes sense in a huge galaxy. People would, quite simply, have different accents, including humans. I like the idea of more actors that aren't from the Anglosphere (Britain, America, Canada, Australia, etc.) playing characters in future works.

 

Where's any "anti-capitalist" message in any of Johnson's movies?

Knives Out isn't portraying those people negatively because they're rich/have profited through the market, rather because their priorities are all out of whack and they're basically contemptible people. TLJ's stuff with DJ and Rose alike isn't attacking capitalism per se, rather corruption and ruthless/selfish people doing the wrong thing. Ostensibly the New Republic was still operating on capitalist principles too during the good years.

Accents, I guess could be seen as a way of branching out, sure. Kinda seems there's more range in that in the ST/anthologies so far than the older stuff anyway. Schmi's about the only human character not sounding British or American in the Fox era stuff, we've at least got a few more options lately.

 

Methinks "rational" and "subjective" might be mixed up in the ol' vocabulary there.

 

I agree with the critique of his past films regarding treatment of female characters. But Ana de Armas is the strongest character in Knive’s Out, and excellently written. I don’t ascribe to this “cancel culture” idea that someone’s past automatically invalidates their present and future. People can learn and change. And we need to be open to that. RJ has improved.

That said, I think Lucasfilm should focus on excellent female and POC directors like Chow and Famuyiwa who’ve delivered excellent material straight away. No reason to keep giving white male directors second chances when there’s so much other talent out there.

 

Quite frankly, I find this whole idea rather stupid to begin with. There is exactly one thing they should base their decisions for a role in a production in, and that is whether they think the person has shown the necessary talent to get the job done. Chow and Famuyiwa have indicated what they are capable of, which is why giving them a chance with something bigger is only logical. But that doesn't somehow mean that if a talented white male director came up with a great idea for a story, that Lucasfilm should ignore him based on being a white male.

Every person has to be judged based on his or her own merits, not on what the gender or skin colour is. Not choosing someone due to the person being a white male, and not because he isn't good enough or because someone else is clearly better, isn't any better than denying the chance to a woman, person of colour, or both. Somehow I doubt that Chow or Famuyiwa would be all that thrilled if them getting chosen for a job would be based on their gender or skin colour and not on them being excellent directors. Generally, people prefer to be chosen based on their skills and accomplishments, and not on whether some detail about them that is completely out of their hands fits right in to fulfill some sort of quota.

 

Whoa man, that's crazy talk. This shall not stand!

 

Thanks Pro. Though I’ve long since abandoned the expectation that people actually read what I say.

 

I don’t think that’s entirely fair. However, I do believe that something, something, I don’t like Marvel, something, something, and most people would agree.

 

This is nonsense. There are plenty of successful female/person-of-color directors out there getting steady work.

You provide a product people eat up & love, nobody cares what you look like or what's in your pants. That goes for movies, music, comedy, whatever it may be. For every minority director getting knocked back/rejected for gigs, there are the same amount of white straight dudes in the same position.

You deliver the goods? You're working and getting praised for it. Any woman churns out some Kathryn Bigelow-quality piece, she's not going unnoticed. You're a black guy putting out stuff on Ryan Coogler's level, recognition's incoming.

 

I mean, it’s no secret that the film industry has not been giving equal opportunities to woman and poc, especially when it comes to directing big blockbuster films. The vast majority of blockbusters, both in the past and present have been directed by white guys.

Just because you can name a couple examples of successful woman and poc directors doesn’t change that.

 

Equality of opportunity should be absolutely guaranteed among all races, backgrounds. But the idea that there needs to be a pre-determined top-down requirement for hiring artists based on their race or ethnicity seems utterly bizarre and more like a subtle insult toward their actual talent. It sounds like a subtle form of racism.

 

I think there is indeed good evidence that there's a lack of equal opportunity in Hollywood. Hollywood is run by a "billionaire's boys club" of insiders and most of the time it's "who you know" that determines whether you get the job. The most successful are the ones with the best connections. Yeah, I'm sure a lot of those insiders happen to be white, but this idea that "white guy" artists as a whole now need to be consciously and deliberately rejected in favor of other races is bizarre. Why do we need to insist on categorizing artists according to race at all?

 

The thing that's been the most noticeable recently is that some of the people in charge of running this website are clearly singling out and categorizing whites as being, acting, and thinking in certain predictable ways and patterns, and it's really starting to piss some of us off. But then again I'm just an ignorant white guy who doesn't deserve to have an opinion on these matters, as has been made clear on a number of threads. Thank you to all for that important reminder, and by all means, keep putting labels, categories, and sub-categories on people so that we can maintain as much division as possible here among fans.

 

edit, like the other’s above said, you don’t speak for all white guys. I’m also a white guy and I have no idea wtf you are talking about? Where has anyone here suggested that white guys need to be ‘consciously and deliberately rejected’?

That’s not what equal opportunity means.

 

Nice try pretending I'm playing the victim card when I'm actually making a completely verifiable observation. Search recent threads and you will see for yourself opinions being rudely dismissed because they are coming from a white person.

 

I'm not a troll and I generally try to stick to positive topics and avoid controversial ones. I made a mistake by clicking on a couple of those threads that I would normally tend to avoid and predictably came across tripe like this:

It's my own fault for even paying attention to toxic conversations and letting myself get pulled in. I'm not going to drag this on anymore. Sorry if I offended anyone.