Hail Of SJW Stupid
Sonny Bunch writes in the Free Beacon of the Coen brothers' fabulous Huh? response to criticism of the whiteness of the cast of their new film, "Hail, Caesar!":
Brothers Ethan and Joel Coen laid bare the absurdity of this thinking in an interview with the Daily Beast:I asked the Coens to respond to criticisms that there aren't more minority characters in the film. In other words, why is #HailCaesarSoWhite?
"Why would there be?" countered Joel Coen. "I don't understand the question. No--I understand that you're asking the question, I don't understand where the question comes from."
Nigel M. Smith gets into the follow-up in The Guardian:
Asked by the Daily Beast's Jen Yamato to respond to the criticism leveled at the film's casting, Joel said: "It's an absolute, absurd misunderstanding of how things get made to single out any particular story and say, 'Why aren't there this, that, or the other thing? It's a fundamental misunderstanding of how stories are written. So you have to start there and say, 'You don't know what you're talking about.'""You don't sit down and write a story and say, 'I'm going to write a story that involves four black people, three Jews, and a dog' -- right?" Joel continued. "If you don't understand that, you don't understand anything about how stories get written and you don't realize that the question you're asking is idiotic. It's not an illegitimate thing to say there should be more diversity in an industry. But that's not what that question is about. That question is about something else."
Ethan concurred, adding: "It's important to tell the story you're telling in the right way, which might involve black people or people of whatever heritage or ethnicity - or it might not."
Helen Mirren explains to The Guardian's Ben Child why Idris Elba wasn't nominated for his performance in Netflix child-soldier drama Beasts of No Nation:
"He [Idris] wasn't nominated because not enough people saw, or wanted to see, a film about child soldiers in Somalia or the Congo or somewhere like that," said the 70-year-old, who was promoting her role as Hollywood gossip columnist Hedda Hopper in new film Trumbo. "They just couldn't face watching that movie and so not enough people saw that movie. It wasn't in the cinema for long enough."
Not to mention the fact that the era the movie is set in wanst known for its diversity
lujlp at February 5, 2016 12:14 AM
Exactly!
Amy Alkon at February 5, 2016 6:11 AM
I was gonna say wasn't it set in the 50s?
NicoleK at February 5, 2016 6:23 AM
It's a satire of Hollywood (and specifically big Bible epics) in the 50s and early 60s. Where a TV personality like Dezi Arnaz was exotic, and Yul Brynner was cast as the exotic other (see The Ten Commandments)
spqr2008 at February 5, 2016 6:43 AM
It's like complaining that Superfly didn't have enough Eskimos.
Cousin Dave at February 5, 2016 6:47 AM
Or why that Queen Elizabeth movie wasn't cast with a black man in the lead role.
Amy Alkon at February 5, 2016 7:03 AM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2016/02/05/hail_of_sjw_stu.html#comment-6431065">comment from Amy AlkonAnd couldn't Tevye have been played by a small Chinese woman?
Amy Alkon at February 5, 2016 7:05 AM
I would watch the hell out of an all Asian version of Fiddler on the Roof. I know it doesn't make any sense, that doesn't mean it's not hilarious.
http://youtu.be/9T6G1_uvGWI
Beth Cartwright at February 5, 2016 7:41 AM
And couldn't Tevye have been played by a small Chinese woman?
I remember reading somewhere (the liner notes to the soundtrack LP, I think), that Fiddler on the Roof was actually well-received in Japan, but the actor who played Tevye there couldn't figure out why it was so popular in the United States.
Old RPM Daddy (OldRPMDaddy at GMail dot com) at February 5, 2016 8:04 AM
I have to say, I don't get Mirren's remarks. This may not be the best analogy, but plenty of people never see the nominees for Best Foreign Picture or Best Animated Feature (sorry if that isn't the correct name), and yet they get nominated anyway. BTW, the 1982 Spanish film "Volver a empezar" (To Begin Again) won the former award, but last I looked, you can't get that on DVD.
In other words, shouldn't it really just be the critics who watch and decide who/what gets nominated? That's what they're paid for, after all.
lenona at February 5, 2016 12:50 PM
John Hurt was robbed of an Oscar for his performance as Winston Smith, in possibly the worst "date" movie of all time, Nineteen Eighty-Four.
Nobody wanted to see that the State could erase your most vital memories of love... easily.
But the flick is almost ridiculously well done.
Radwaste at February 5, 2016 1:06 PM
Look, the Oscars, the Academy Awards, there all tax dodges.
They are huge lavish parties where money is wasted giving out gifts like new dresses and jewelry, and "stars" and studios can then claim the after parties where they give out door prizes and cater dinner and drinks as a business expense allowing them to spend money on really cool shit and write it off on thier taxes.
who really gives a shit who wins best sound editing?
Its all one giant self congratulatory circle jerk to avoid paying the government all that extra tax money they wanna spend on what they want
lujlp at February 5, 2016 2:36 PM
lujlp: "Its all one giant self congratulatory circle jerk . . ."
Yep, that defines it very well.
charles at February 5, 2016 9:08 PM
I was excited to see beast of no nation. I turned it off after 30 mins. No surprise to me at all it wasn't nominated. It simply wasn't that god, subject matter aside.
momof4 at February 6, 2016 7:20 AM
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