> I would never think of a movie were Kunta Kinte is Dutch and is portrait by Chris Hemsworth
Kunta Kinte was a slave in a story that heavily dealt with slavery, set in a time and setting where slavery was race-based, for an audience somewhat familiar with the history of that time and setting.
If you made him Dutch and portrayed by Chris Hemsworth you'd have to include in your movie all kinds of extra exposition and world building to set the background for the story.
Most of the race changes people have mentioned so far did not involve characters where their race was either important to the story or to reducing the amount of exposition and world building you need to convey the story's context to the audience.
Not dutch, but Chris Hemsworth could perfectly fit in the role of a --slavic-- people in an history of slavery. The first slaves with that name where white. In this particular case the history is easily translatable to a different location.
> did not involve characters where their race was either important to
I think the appearances of a character is quite important if the author took the time to describe it, don't you think?
Would a Little women adaptation where the three women are two trans gender people, one Black, one Asian and one South American person that identifies as woman, be a good idea?
We all know what "Little women" is about, we all expect that, not something else completely unrelated to the original IP.
Why isn't Jay Gatsby black in the movies and only black people in the book are also black in the movie?
Want my opinion?
People are making a big fuss about the ethnicity of actors, but I'm more inclined to think that Disney's worried about another failure like Tim Burton's Dumbo (the original Dumbo is considered unacceptable by today's standards and people staid away from the new one) and is playing it safe with a story (Pinocchio) that has no such bad legacy attached. it's so safe that there's even a "project Pinocchio" in my country against racism in schools.
> If you made him Dutch and portrayed by Chris Hemsworth you'd have to include in your movie all kinds of extra exposition and world building to set the background for the story.
That's exactly my point.
A black fairy is not an issue because she is black, but because it's a plot hole that the original story don't have.
>> If you made him Dutch and portrayed by Chris Hemsworth you'd have to include in your movie all kinds of extra exposition and world building to set the background for the story.
> That's exactly my point.
> A black fairy is not an issue because she is black, but because it's a plot hole that the original story don't have.
I just watched a couple trailers for the new Pinocchio movie and they included a scene with the fairy.
She's dressed in glowing white sparkly clothes, has translucent sparkly wings, a wand with a star on the end that is clearly a magic wand, is surrounded by sparkles, transfigured Pinocchio, and it looks like she travels in some sort of amorphous flowing light blob.
The amount of extra exposition and world building needed to let the audience know that the character is a fairy is zero.
The black bald fairy is just a stunt to create fake controversy, to sell tickets.
And if any children read this, let me tell you that either you run to ask money to your parents and go to itchy and scratchy land, or you are a bunch of little racists. You are warned. Gimme money.
Kunta Kinte was a slave in a story that heavily dealt with slavery, set in a time and setting where slavery was race-based, for an audience somewhat familiar with the history of that time and setting.
If you made him Dutch and portrayed by Chris Hemsworth you'd have to include in your movie all kinds of extra exposition and world building to set the background for the story.
Most of the race changes people have mentioned so far did not involve characters where their race was either important to the story or to reducing the amount of exposition and world building you need to convey the story's context to the audience.