Actress Constance Wu Slams ‘The Great Wall’ Trailer As Whitewashing
Writing “Our heroes don’t look like Matt Damon,” Fresh Off the Boat star Constance Wu blasted the upcoming The Great Wall as yet another example of cinematic whitewashing and that Hollywood should stop “perpetuating the racist myth that only a white man can save the world.”
In one in a string of Tweets yesterday, Wu said she was “Not blaming Damon, the studio, the Chinese financiers.” She added, “It’s not about blame, It’s about AWARENESS.”
Wu’s comments came in response to Thursday’s release of a trailer for Legendary’s The Great Wall, a clip that suggests the real reason for the construction of China’s 5,500-mile superstructure was to keep out Godzilla-sized monsters. The trailer portrays Damon as a Caucasian good-guy warrior helping (or leading) Chinese fighters to battle the creatures.
“I was born into battle,” Damon narrates at the start of the trailer (see below), and it looks like he got one where he wasn’t looking.
Here’s Wu’s original comment:
“Remember,” wrote the Taiwanese-American Wu in her initial message, “it’s not about blaming individuals, which will only lead to soothing their lame ‘b-but I had good intentions! but…money!'”
“Rather, it’s about point out the repeatedly implied racist notion that white people are superior to POC [people of color] and that POC need salvation from our own color via white strength.”
Legendary’s The Great Wall, directed by Zhang Yimou, is set for a February 2017 opening. Here’s the trailer:
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