Michael B. Jordan, Actor, at a #BlackLivesMatter Protest (Credit: Rich Fury/Getty Images)
I am sure that all of you know the hashtags #BlackLivesMatter and #StopAsianHate, which are trending globally nowadays to raise awareness regarding racial injustice. However, nobody would ever disagree that we are still living in a world full of discrimination, even in a smaller “world” that consists of actors, actresses and film producers only.
The Academy Awards, more commonly known as the Oscars, is one of the most prestigious awards in the industry worldwide. Still, it failed to convince film lovers with their selection of winners. In 2015, the hashtag #OscarsSoWhite emerged on the Internet as a joke of a dominantly white nomination that year. In the consequent year, all 20 acting nominations were given to white actors again. This attracted attention worldwide as to whether race problems existed in the Oscars. Oh, it’s not hard to find evidence that racism at the Oscars was nothing new: Miyoshi Umeki is the only Asian to win an acting Oscar in 1957, only one non-white woman has won best actress, and the list goes on.
Yet, we might have seen glimpses of the twilight, that the situation is finally brightening. In the Oscars 2019, the film Black Panther saw Ruth Carter winning Best Costume Design, becoming the first African American woman to win this award, and Hannah Beachler winning Best Production Design, who was the first woman of colour to be nominated and won in that category. Parasite, a South Korea film, became a big winner of the Oscars 2020 by winning four awards, including Bong Joon-Ho winning the Best Director award, which was the second Asian director to win that award. In the same year, The Academy also doubled the number of female voters and tripled their voters of colour.
While the Oscars is trying to kick racism out, one particular movie might have taken a huge step forward. Recently, Marvel released “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings'', which had earned more than $250 million worldwide. While it was Marvel's first superhero film with an Asian lead, did you know that the comic story of Shang-chi was actually Marvel’s one of the most racially problematic series of all time?
Comic Book of Shang-Chi (Credit: Leinil Francis Yu/Marvel)
Apparently in the original comic book in the 1970s, all faces of the Asian characters were in unnatural colours, the main characters spoke stilted English and were without any clothes and shoes, and Shang-chi’s father was even shaped to be stereotypical of the Asian immigrants in the last century. The creators of the movie were very conscious of that and hence we saw none of that in the final product. Even though the Chinese were still frustrated by the fact that Marvel decided to make a superhero film based on this racist story, at least we saw signs of racial equality in films.
It’s an elephant in the room, we all know that. But, the efforts made by the film industry have to be appreciated. Let’s hope it is a big step closer towards racial justice at all levels!
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