Whitewashing the Movies

Asian Erasure and White Subjectivity in U.S. Film Culture

David C Oh

• Publisher: Rutgers University Press
• Year: 2021
• Print ISBN: 9781978808621, 9781978808638
• eBook ISBN: 9781978808645
• Topic: Media & Performing Arts
• Subtopic: Film History & Criticism

Whitewashing the Movies addresses the popular practice of excluding Asian actors from playing Asian characters in film. Media activists and critics have denounced contemporary decisions to cast White actors to play Asians and Asian Americans in movies such as Ghost in the Shell and Aloha. The purpose of this book is to apply the concept of "whitewashing" in stories that privilege White identities at the expense of Asian/American stories and characters. To understand whitewashing across various contexts, the book analyzes films produced in Hollywood, Asian American independent production, and US-China co-productions. Through the analysis, the book examines the ways in which whitewashing matters in the project of Whiteness and White racial hegemony. The book contributes to contemporary understanding of mediated representations of race by theorizing whitewashing, contributing to studies of Whiteness in media studies, and producing a counter-imagination of Asian/American representation in Asian-centered stories.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Introduction
• 1. Whitewashing Romance in Hawai’i: Aloha
• 2. White China Experts, Asian American Twinkies: Shanghai Calling and Already Tomorrow in Hong Kong
• 3. White Grievance, Heroism, and Postracist, Mixed-Race Inclusion: 47 Ronin
• 4. Satire and the Villainy of Kim Jong-un: The Interview
• 5. White Survival in Southeast Asia: No Escape and The Impossible
• 6. Whitewashing Anime Remakes: Ghost in the Shell and Dragonball Evolution
• 7. Transnational Coproduction and the Ambivalence of White Masculine Heroism: The Great Wall, Outcast, and Enter the Warriors Gate
• Conclusion
• Acknowledgments
• Notes
• References
• Index
• About the Author