2016 Oscars

Jait · Mar 1, 2016

No. I'm physically the poster boy for Aryan youth. So is my son...who is half Cuban.

The idea that race means a god-damned thing anymore in America is in and of itself racist. Is anyone going to really argue that blacks in Hollywood are black? Does Will Smith and his family experience anything black? And again, I doubt if even half this board knows there's a difference between race and ethnicity. But Hollywood sure as shit does not and never will. Race to blacks is purely a black and white issue. To whites it's actually...diverse. But that's racist too.

PatrickStar · Mar 1, 2016

Jait_sl said:
God forbid they start nominating Chinese Americans, or fucks sake a Native American.

Nope. They are too busy trotting out Asians to make a joke about the stereotype of them (us) being good at math and prevalent at child labor. But hey I guess next year they can trot out 3 black kids and laud them for having welfare moms, dads in jail, and being #1 in the Power Rankings for rioting and looting. #diversity

Szlia · Mar 1, 2016

Let me quote myself from a few pages back:

About asian nominations, the first thing that came to mind is Sessue Hayakawa for The Bridge on the River Kwai (best supporting actor). That same year (1957) Miyoshi Umeki, a japanese actress who later became american, won for best supporting actresse in a movie called Sayonara (which also earned Red Buttons a best actor win). Also Pat Morita got nominated for best supporting actor for The Karate Kid. Mako got nominated for best supporting actor for The Sand Peebles in 1966. Ryuichi Sakamoto won for the score of The Last Emperor. More recently, Ken Watanabe got nominated for best supporting actor in The Last Samurai. Also closer to us, Rinko Kikuchi was nominated for best actress in 2006 for Babel...

Also Ang Lee got a nom' for Life of Pi and this year you had When Marnie Was There in the animated feature film category. In the acting categories, if the nominations are not common, winning is even more rare as only three asians won: the aforementioned Miyoshi Umeki, the cambodian american Haing S. Ngor (who is also part of two small clubs: winner for their first part and winner as a non-professional actor) and Ben Kingsley (his father is indian).

It should be mentioned that things are not a lot better for latino. To quotean articleI found on the net: " From 1964 to 2011, no Latino actors were nominated for Best Actor, save for Edward Olmos in 1988. No Latina actresses were nominated for Best Actress until Fernanda Montenegro in 1998." As for winners in the acting categories, there are only five (same article): "Jos? Ferrer, Anthony Quinn (twice), Rita Moreno, Mercedes Ruehl (whose mother is Irish and Cuban) and Benicio Del Toro".

Unsurprisingly (or maybe surprisingly considering the number of westerns made in Hollywood through the years), Only two native american actors got acting nominations: Chief Dan George (Little Big Man, 1970) and Graham Greene (Dances with the Wolves, 1991 and The Green Mile, 1999). The only winner I could find is Buffy St-Marie who won for best song in 1982! In fact when you google about native americans and oscars, the results are saturated by the time Marlon Brando did not come to pick his price and sent in his stead Sacheen Littlefeather who read a speech about the poor treatment of native americans in the film industry. That was in 1973. I guess not much changed on that front in 43 years...

Lithose · Mar 1, 2016

Szlia_sl said:
It should be mentioned that things are not a lot better for latino. To quotean articleI found on the net: " From 1964 to 2011, no Latino actors were nominated for Best Actor, save for Edward Olmos in 1988. No Latina actresses were nominated for Best Actress until Fernanda Montenegro in 1998." As for winners in the acting categories, there are only five (same article): "Jos? Ferrer, Anthony Quinn (twice), Rita Moreno, Mercedes Ruehl (whose mother is Irish and Cuban) and Benicio Del Toro".

The thing of it is, less than 3% of the population was Hispanic in 64. And a large part of the growth in the graph below was not driven by live births (Which remained essentially level) but rather by migration waves starting in 1990, and culminating in 2005. Which means that a HUGE amount of the 55 million Hispanics are either first generation migrants (Legal or illegal), and may have difficulty with basic institutional norms in the country, with the language, with obtaining documents, lack of documents/credentials (Education ect) and almost zero wealth (Which means they have to work very hard, and need a very stable job, but one that doesn't require all the things they lack). Or they are the children of this first generation, which usually means they can speak English (And thus have a big advantage) and they has access to basic institutional structures and thus the credentials for them (Most probably went to Highschool and have diplomas, a HUGE leg up on their parents)--in addition they probably have a TINY about of wealth from their parents hard work. But does that sound like someone who can afford to do film as a career choice?

No, typically at the point of a second generation migrant the goal is to get a better job, with higher pay than the undocumented work your parents had to do, which you CAN do now because of having those credentials and knowing the language. Your children? Those will be the first generation who can really think about college or film; and we're starting to see the beginning of that right now (Along with the longer standing naturalized citizens from migrations in earlier). Keep in mind, 9 Hipsanic people were nominated this year; and it's obviousHispanic people are rising to prominencein this field. Is 25 years after mass migration really racism? I think, give how a migratory generational timeline goes, the fact that we haven't seen a lot of Hispanics yet is pretty normal. It's really odd that a country that assimilates MILLIONS of people is being called racist because it takes a population a little while to reach the heights of fame and stardom. (Not you, Szi, others) There are practical answers for this stuff, and we've seen these patterns before.....

Italians saw the same trends, they didn't appear in a number of leading roles, and at the helm of major films until the 60's and 70's. Which was around 40-60 years (Depending on the wave) AFTER the major Italian American migrations happened (1890-1917). But the real irony here in looking at Latinos for diversity (In terms of Diversity=non white/European descendent people, since most of the protests have been about that specifically) isLatin Americans are 'white people', just like Italians. Citing them for diversity has been a completely artificial taxonomy of 'racial diversity of non-european white people'. They are European descendants, who speak a European language, and hold modified western (Latin) values, they are this generations Italians. Hell, even their name, Latino, is merely a representation of their lingual European routes, they are the off shoots of Latin cultural dominance through the Roman Catholic Church and Rome (Just like Italians, and to a lesser degree the French.)

I haven't researched Asian migration and population figures, but they are, in TOTAL a 5% population in the U.S.; and I'm not sure how that population has grown (How much is based on migration, a lot like the Hispanic population?)....The reality is there are so many things to look at before 'racism'. The lesson here is that the U.S. is a melting pot well beyond any other nation except for India, and Hollywood is one of the best examples of that diversity mentality (Admittedly some places are the opposite)--it is a painfully liberal, tolerant town (Often castigating themselves for even perceived failures), modern Hollywood being called Racist should illustrate that people are tossing that card outway, waytoo quick. At this point the specter of Racism lurks for merely failing tooverrepresent a group, or failing to assimilate millions of people in less than 2 generations; it's gottencrazy.

Lithose · Mar 1, 2016

PatrickStar_sl said:
Nope. They are too busy trotting out Asians to make a joke about the stereotype of them (us) being good at math and prevalent at child labor. But hey I guess next year they can trot out 3 black kids and laud them for having welfare moms, dads in jail, and being #1 in the Power Rankings for rioting and looting. #diversity

Asians are Schrodinger white people anyway. Silicon Valley has Asians getting paid more than white people, and way over represented per their population--and instantly you guys are no longer a minority and are essentially 'white' by most of these outrage rags (Unless there is a controversy, like with Pao; then Asians are Asians again). If you're under represented, though, then you're back to being a minority. That is the most insidiously racist thing about all this rhetoric--'being white' isn't even a skin color or ethnic/heritage grouping anymore, it is literally synonymous with the average success of a population in a market. Asians in tech fields? White. Asians in film? Minority.

Szlia · Mar 1, 2016

I am too lazy to relink it for you, but I think I already mentioned that mexicans of purely european descent are a small minority of mexicans. The fact they are an extremely visible minority is a socio-economico-cultural oddity that is probably more complicated than "old european money breed among themselves." Probably!

Anyway, there is another issue: the way Hollywood works. It is like a black hole for international talents, so it is not that related with the immigration waves. Obviously, for those that are in front of the camera, it's a lot easier to find success if your primary language is english. That's why there are tons of actors from Australia, England, Ireland, Canada, etc. That said, there is a number of thespians who are not from english speaking countries who do have a modicum of success in Hollywood. In a not so distant past, Marion Cotillard comes to mind, G?rard Depardieu, Benicio Del Toro, Christoph Waltz, Daniel Br?hl, Penelope Cruz, Antonio Banderas, Mads Mikkelsen, Monica Bellucci, Vincent Cassel, etc. There are some asians too, but truth be told they often seem involved for reasons that have more to do with marketing than anything else (there are exceptions like Rinko Kikuchi, Doona Bae or Ken Watanabe).

What I am getting at is that, more than immigration, what is important is a domestic film industry (unless you enter Hollywood through fashion modeling or through the music industry). That being said, while Mexico, Brazil and Argentina have sizable film industries it seems there are more behind the camera talents that make the trip to Hollywood than front of the camera talents (Brazil gave us Walter Salles and Jos? Padilha... not too sure about Argentina I must say). It should also be said that demographics of these three countries are pretty different. Almost 80% of people in Argentina are purely from european descent while in Brazil it's a little under 50% and less than 20% for Mexico.

Another thing to point out is that even countries with an important film industry and sizable visible minorities are not very good at making minority talents emerge so the Black Hole effect of Hollywood does not apply to them. A good example of this is France. While there is a number of northern african thespians, writers and directors, there is extremely few black actors. I mean I don't think I can name 10 off the top of my head. Omar Sy, Pascal L?gitimus, Isaach de Bankol? (the guy has a career in Hollywood too!), Mouss Diouf, A?ssa Ma?ga... yeah... I can picture four more but don't have the names and they are about 3% of the french population...

Lithose · Mar 1, 2016

Szlia_sl said:
I am too lazy to relink it for you, but I think I already mentioned that mexicans of purely european descent are a small minority of mexicans. The fact they are an extremely visible minority is a socio-economico-cultural oddity that is probably more complicated than "old european money breed among themselves." Probably!

According to a study of 23 and Me through their DB, and one by UCLA (I'll try to look up later) the Average Mexican break down is 65-75% European and 15% Native American, and 6% African (And as you said, Mexicans by FAR have the least 'pure' European acenestory, a lot of my wife's family has a lot of Native American in them). So while, yes, some SA countries aren't pure European in terms of DNA, they are mostly (Vast majority) European in genetic lineage. However, beyond that; that is breaking them down taxonomically by racial trends that aren't really used anymore (Caucasoid, Negroid, Mongoloid)--most ethnic groups are broken up by language or culture. Withappearances('white' or 'black 'features'/skin) being the 'pop' standard. Latin America has a very strong Latin base, stretching back to Spain, culturally they are European. (And I'm married to a fairly brown woman BUT, a lot of her family is what is known as 'white Hispanic', a lot of Mexicans are nearly indistinguishable; like Italians, if they haven't been in the sun, they are hard to tell apart from immutable looks

)

Using 'purely' as a litmus test? Is a way to really dog the numbers to try and make a point that doesn't really work. Plenty of Americans have some Native American or African in them, 'purity' is not a metric that makes any kind of sense given the mostly superficial nature of whiteness being spoken of in the media (Which, granted I know you're not doing--but my beef is mostly with that).

Szlia_sl said:
Anyway, there is another issue: the way Hollywood works. It is like a black hole for international talents, so it is not that related with the immigration waves. Obviously, for those that are in front of the camera, it's a lot easier to find success if your primary language is english. That's why there are tons of actors from Australia, England, Ireland, Canada, etc.

What I am getting at is that, more than immigration, what is important is a domestic film industry (unless you enter Hollywood through fashion modeling or through the music industry). That being said, while Mexico, Brazil and Argentina have sizable film industries it seems there are more behind the camera talents that make the trip to Hollywood than front of the camera talents (Brazil gave us Walter Salles and Jos? Padilha... not too sure about Argentina I must say). It should also be said that demographics of these three countries are pretty different. Almost 80% of people in Argentina are purely from european descent while in Brazil it's a little under 50% and less than 20% for Mexico.

I might not be understanding your argument here, so forgive me if I'm responding incorrectly (I'm not trying to be obtuse)...But by Black hole you mean Hollywood attracts international talent; and thus counting immigration shouldn't really matter since people can come from SA (And you list a bunch of countries who send stars over, proving that Hollywood is an international industry). If this is about right, then the spoiler is on topic, if not, disregard. (It's long, so I tossed in a spoiler).

If that's you're point, is it really about 'race'? I don't think it is at all, and using the label racist is very silly in this case, I believe. The countries you point out are mostly extremely wealthy compared to just about any SA country. Your list almost perfectly correlates with the top 20 GDP countries in the world, thesole exception being Brazil--but as you said, Brazil is one of the few SA countries that does send talent up to Hollywood. The fact is, wealthier countries have two massive advantages which facilitates them sending talent to Hollywood. 1.) As you said, they speak English; and even the non-English speaking people you listed? Come from countries where English ismandatorywithin primary school. 2.) Money; you're going to find groups of people who can work and act at the same time, this simply isn't an option for many people living in SA outside of Brazil (The next richest is Argentina, but the GDP there is literally 1/3 of the lowest country on your first list. Forget about waiting tables and submitting scripts or looking for gigs, that just isn't possible when you need to scrape by working 12 hour days in a factory or a field. It probably wasn't a coincidence that Hollywood and even technologies like the motion picture developed during the industrial revolution; excess required labor is what allows for this kind of market, not just the availability of technology. I actually doubt advances in Camera tech would have come so quick if the U.S. and Europe had not been wealthy enough to spend so much time on the arts.).

So, given that, it seems thebestchance for a Latino to make it in Hollywood, is to be a naturalized citizen in the U.S., which means they are in a country with a GDP rate that (After a few generations) can sustain thepossibilityof acting and working (While waiting for roles). That's what a lot of people don't seem to account for, acting isnota sustainable job for 90% of the people who attempt it, most 'actors' began their careers acting, while working--if you're in a completely impoverished country, that isn't going to be possible except local acting (Theaters ect). A countries wealth has a lot to do with how well it works within the Hollywood machine. Now you mention this in a roundabout way by saying having a "domestic film industry" is important. Having a domestic film industry through is probably just another way of saying 'being wealthy enough to HAVE an entertainment industry that focuses on film, rather than local theater'. Not every country has that kind of wealth. (So I believe we both agree here, we're just saying it in different ways.)

Which brings us to the final point. Of the countries you listed, most of them are 90+% homogeneously white (Exception Canada/France). And unlike the U.S., their minority populations (Even in Canada/France) are not single large groups (12% African, 15% Hispanic for the U.S.). They are usually made up of a collage of many different ethnic backgrounds (They more reflect the U.S. Asian population). So, it seems to me, of course Hollywood is drawing in 'mostly whites', the pools which actors can be drawn from are 'mostly white' due to country wealth, and institutional naturalization (Learning English). The BEST shot a Hispanic person probably has for being in the film industry is probably immigration, and then developing in a high GDP nation, since Hispanic people can really only immigrate to the U.S., U.S. immigration rates seem incredibly important for figuring out trends on diversity in Hollywood.

Now, that said, it all goes back to the main point. We can assume that wealth, or as you said, the lack of a domestic film industry is the cause of Hollywood not getting a lot of international Hispanic names (For example). Is that racist though? Is Hollywood to blame for the lack of domestic film industries inOTHER nations? If the Hollywood has a logical reason for fewer Latinos given the domestic population in the U.S.; then why does the lack of international draw make them racist? Is it is up to them to fix the GDP of entire other nations now to ensure divesity? You see what I'm getting at? Using the term racism to describe this problem is utterly myopic and discounts the enormous complexity of the situation, and really simplifies it into a useless description. It's more about wealth than skin color. (And that argument isn't really against you. You haven't said this is a racial problem, my point is mainly about the media's take on this--it seems very silly to me, the problem is obviously a lot more complex than racism.)

(And this doesn't even touch on the argument about marketing. Which I personally think is growing weaker due to international sales ticking up for Hollywood--but it does require some debate, since the majority of sales happen in countries with massive majorities of Caucasians. The popular argument would be Asking China for more white actors, or Bollywood. Since Hollywood has shown black people in main roles rough equal to their population since the 90's, Latinos and Asians are the ones with the gripe, but if the Latino domestic population only recently exploded, was it really fair to demand films within mostly 'white' countries have foreign actors? Would we feel comfortable making that demand of ANYONE else for a population that was not currently in their country in an amount larger than a very tiny minority of sub 5%? (As was the case 40 years ago for latinos) As I said though, I find those arguments to be weaker, simply because Hollywood has a lot of penetration now in Foreign markets, while those industries are mostly domestic. I also think it is pretty silly to prefer someone based on skin color, so meh. But marketing is marketing, and movies are a business AND an art, not just an art.)

Szlia_sl said:
Another thing to point out is that even countries with an important film industry and sizable visible minorities are not very good at making minority talents emerge so the Black Hole effect of Hollywood does not apply to them. A good example of this is France. While there is a number of northern african thespians, writers and directors, there is extremely few black actors. I mean I don't think I can name 10 off the top of my head. Omar Sy, Pascal L?gitimus, Isaach de Bankol? (the guy has a career in Hollywood too!), Mouss Diouf, A?ssa Ma?ga... yeah... I can picture four more but don't have the names and they are about 3% of the french population...

Well, again to be fair, it's VERY difficult to find numbers on French racial populations. But most of the numbers still indicate an 80-85% homogeneous population. Now, I'm not schooled in french movies; so you're probably completely right. But the big question shouldn't be how many actors there are, but how many roles they fill. If they are getting 9% of the roles; then you're still fairly diverse in terms of representation. Again, I have no idea if that's the case, but if french marketing works like U.S. marketing, smaller numbers of actors play larger numbers of roles due to marketing draw (And all the good and bad that goes with it).

Szlia · Mar 1, 2016

As a foreword to this reply, I think it is important to note that at no point in these previous posts I talked about racism. I am merely trying to describe the situation, not the complex mechanisms that lead to the situation.

About the ethnicity of mexicans: there is a number of ways to try and split and label populations, but in the end, for these kinds of social matters the frontiers are kinda blurry. As you mentioned, the huge majority of the mexican population (80ish percent) has genetic ties with Europe. That being said, they do with varying degrees. About 60% of mexicans self identify as mixed race (it should be noted that from a genetic stand point 90ish % of the population of Mexico is mixed race). It would be interesting to see at what percentage they identify other mexicans as mixed race, but I did not encounter that in my trip through wikipedia and the interweb.

About the Black Hole: Obviously, the mystique of Hollywood attracts people from all over the world and so does the american dream in general, but what I had in mind specifically here are people who become stars or at least get noticed in their domestic film/entertainment industry and use that success to open the door of the Hollywoodian studios. Some do the Hollywood experience from their own accord ("I've had some success at home and I may even have been in films that had some international exposure, so let's find an agent and try to find some work in Hollywood!"), but some are also called, especially if they had films that got noticed in festivals or got released in the US and got the attention of some powerful LA people (that's regularly the case for stars that love a film by a foreign director, want to make a film with them and act as facilitators or even co-producers).

Obviously, Hollywood cannot create foreign talents out of thin air and it's not their job to do it. It's also not their business if these foreign film industries are not good at having a talent pool that represents the ethnic composition of their country. That being said, what we can notice is that among the non english speaking international talents that find work in Hollywood as actors/actresses, the overwhelming majority is caucasian, almost totally ignoring a number of huge film industries.

India: note that Dev Patel is british, that Freida Pinto was an international model before Slumdog Millionnaire and never stared in an indian film and that director Tarsem Singh started making music videos after studying in California. So Hollywood does not ignore indians, but ignores the indian film industry!

Korea, Hong Kong, China: We've seen several korean directors, but very few korean thespians, a number of Hong Kong directors, but again not that many people in front of the camera (Chow Yun Fat, Michelle Yeoh, Jet Li, Jackie Chan). Mainland China provided no director I can think of but we have seen glimpses of actresses Gong Li, Zhang Ziyi and also Tang Wei.

Iran: Despite a sizable exodus for political reasons, Iran really only provided Hollywood with Golshifteh Farahani (Body of Lies, Exodus). On the up side, she lives and works in France now and will be in the next Pirates of the Caribbean as well as the next Jim Jarmush movie!

Japan: Ryuhei Kitamura and Hideo Nakata both have an american film to their directing credits, but they are the only two I can think of. As far as actors and actresses go... We mentioned Rinko Kikuchi, Ken Watanabe... Tadanobu Asano is Thor's friend N?6 in two scenes per Thor film...

Now if we want to talk about racism or crypto-racism I think the main issue is what is "neutral." Obviously there area number of parts that require a certain type of person. If you are doing a biopic on Andr? the Giant, it kinda makes sense to hire a tall guy unless you want to spend the shooting doing camera tricks or the post production doing CGI. In the same way, a number of characters in fiction film require a certain ethnicity (or at least the apparence of this ethnicity) unless you want to take a lot of artistic license (see Cate Blanchett and several other playing Bob Dylan in I'm Not There). That can be because the character is based on a real person, because the context (geographic, historic) of the story requires it, etc. But if you look at the parts in general, there is a quantity of parts that are what I would call "neutral."

So really the argument is 2-pronged:

1) There are not enough parts that require minorities, because not enough stories that require them are being told. The Academy Award corollary is that the academy favors biopics and period dramas (and musicals!) and that the diversity and the quality in those that could require minorities is not really there (slavery, civil right and the occasional athlete or musician... can do better!).

2) "Neutral" is too often synonymous with "white man" when it does not have to. Also minorities often land "neutral" parts of a specific nature: the supporting cast of cops, doctors and miscellaneous public servants.

There are very few minority actors that landed "neutral" leading parts. The quintessential example being Will Smith.

A poster child for N?2 for me is a film I have not seen (shame on me): He's Just Not That Into You. Maybe it's because of The Wire, but we have here a romantic comedy set in Baltimore with 9 characters. Not two or three but nine! All caucasians. Obviously there are legitimate counter-arguments ("write what you know", "if you add interracial relationships, it becomes a theme you need to address, so you lose a bit of the focus of the movie", etc). But still...

That said, I don't think it is deliberate racism/misogyny at all (at least in most cases). I just think people tell stories they care about and that when you are a white man surrounded by white men, it's pretty natural to turn "neutral" into "white man", if you don't consciously take a step back and consider this type of representation issues.

The whole marketing layer is more dubious though, but I am not sure how much of an impact they have on the cast (an anecdotal example in my google fu for these posts is that Salma Hayek supposedly was the first choice for Gravity but did not land the part because a producer said that someone who sounds like a maid in space would not believable!). In any case, I am not sure I am so hot on pragmatic business decisions that account for the racism or supposed racism of your customers. That feels like being part of the problem and not part of the solution to me.

Damn I got a serious case of wall-of-textite aka Lithosite! It's contagious!

Drakurii · Mar 5, 2016

Tina Fey Calls Out The Oscars for Political Correctness, Liberal Run : Reason.com

Tina Fey blasted this years Oscars show for its over-the-top political correctness and predictably liberal preaching.

"Halfway through, I was like, 'This is some real Hollywood bullshit,'" she told Howard Stern on Tuesday. "Everyone is telling me what to do, and people are yelling at me about rape and corporate greed and climate change. It's like, guys, pick a lane."

Fey was probably referring to Lady Gaga's performance of The Hunting Ground's "Until It Happens to You," which featured survivors of rape taking the stage; The Big Short's Adam McKay, who called out rich people for buying elections in his acceptance speech after winning Best Adapted Screenplay; and Leonardo DiCaprio, who rambled on about climate change during his Best Actor speech.

"?They?re like, ?We?re going to fix everything tonight.? Like, you?re all rich,? said Fey. ?Why are you yelling at me about corporate greed?"

This not the first time Fey has made such criticisms. She previously announced that she was done apologizing for offensive jokes after some on the left accused an episode of her show, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, of racial insensitivity.

"Let's face it, actors are very stupid," she said.

Later, she defended DiCaprio against Stern's accusations that he is a misogynist because he sleeps with a lot of 18-year-old models.
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"Is it misogynistic to sleep with a bunch of women who want to sleep with you?" asked Fey. "I don't think it's misogynistic. I think everybody there is up for it."

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2016 Oscars

Jait

Molten Core Raider

PatrickStar

Trakanon Raider

Szlia

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Lithose

Buzzfeed Editor

Lithose

Buzzfeed Editor

Szlia

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Lithose

Buzzfeed Editor

Szlia

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Drakurii

Golden Baron of the Realm