Sofia Coppola Responds to ‘The Beguiled’ Backlash

[hewontgo]

Sofia Coppola Responds to ‘The Beguiled’ Backlash https://t.co/HSsVP6GObJ #thebeguiled pic.twitter.com/dfJD67aDwC
- IndieWire (@IndieWire) 15 juillet 2017

Coppola has been criticized for not including an African American character in her film.

following up this postShe felt that treating slavery as a side-plot would be insulting

Comments

[megalixer]

tbh I wouldn't want Sofia Coppola to try and tackle the issue of slavery in one of her movies, it's obvious that she would be hopelessly out of her depth there.

that said, she has 0 excuse for casting only the whitest of the white girls in all of her movies set in the present day.

[ms_mmelissa]

that said, she has 0 excuse for casting only the whitest of the white girls in all of her movies set in the present day.

I know no one saw these movies, but she actually has worked with woc before: Katie Chang in The Bling Ring and Maya Rudolph and Rashida Jones in A Very Murray Christmas.

But there definitely is colourism/racism in her casting that she needs to reflect on and hopefully all the discussion around The Beguiled will actually lead to her actually reflecting more on how she casts her films.

[sadmagikarp]

please stop. i don't know why your ass is always trying to defend her obvious distaste for poc and minority culture (unless its fetishized and mocked like in lost in translation). and lmao @ katie chang, maya rudolph and rashida jones. like...take a seat

[anydoppelganger]

I laughed out loud when I saw that list. truly some of the most white passing actors one could pick

[ms_mmelissa]

I'm actually shocked she addressed this, I thought she would bury her head in the sand the way she did with the criticism for LiT and The Bling Ring.

As someone who hasn't read the book or seen the original Beguiled I didn't love her cutting out the only black character, but I also am not super upset about it. Like best case scenario we would have a well drawn character who would still be a slave as interpreted by a white woman based on a book by a white man.

Here's hoping she'll cast woc in her next films even when the movie doesn't require it.

[sassandthecity]

Kirsten Dunst's character was a freed mixed race character in the book so she white-washed two characters.

[winterbam]

Are you serious?   Damn that's foul.

[ms_mmelissa]

Oh really? I definitely want to read the book now because it sounds way more interesting than the movie. Have you seen the Eastwood Beguiled film? Is it the same there?

[realblast3]

Not that it excuses her at all, but I think an important part of her new "explanation" that should at least be included in the thread summary is she claims her version of 'The Beguiled' takes place AFTER The Civil War.

It's at least a distinction that should be noted because the narrative of "A Civil War movie without slaves!" is at least invalidated. And should be altered.

Not that there's an excuse to not include black roles in a movie set AFTER the Civil War, during reconstruction, EITHER, but still, we should at least be accurate in our complaints.

[ms_mmelissa]

It's not though, it's set right in the middle of the civil war.

[frenchoral]

ummm in the movie they're still very clearly during the war

they even say multiple times that they hope it'll be over soon

[kunklebunkle]

No, it's not. Or at least that was not clarified in the movie.

[sassandthecity]

Like, if you don't want to deal with that aspect, maybe you just shouldn't do the story?

[frenchoral]

I saw the film and yikes the whiteness is GLARING to the point where it adds another layer of creepiness