Al Jazeera in Hollywood
Posted by Dave | Filed under film, reflections
Came across this video on Youtube today:
This is Josh Rushing, the former US Marine and present Al Jazeera correspondent, interviewing Arab celebrities in Hollywood talking about their experiences in the film industry. I suppose it’s sort of an awareness piece with the intention of presenting an alternate perspective on the double-standard that exists in film and the greater culture. And it is that, a double-standard: portraying all people of a particular ethnicity as “the bad guy” - that’s not new.
I appreciate the comments from the actors particularly. They seemed very even handed. I also appreciate that Rushing highlighted films that also portray Arabs positively. I’d forgotten about that little movie with Orlando Bloom, “Kingdom of Heaven.” It’s actually quite amazing the non-villanous way the producers portrayed Salahaddin, probably a first for western media in the thousand year history since the crusades. I welcome opinions of this video in the comments.
January 18th, 2009 at 1:06 am
a couple of movies don’t really swing the overall trend of the demonizing of the muslims in our culture. it bothers me heavily that it’s ‘ok’ to complete slander this culture in everyday life. to the majority of people in our country, muslims are the enemy. so i don’t know what happens first; does the media change then the majority of people or do the majority of people change then the media will, i don’t know. lets challenge ignorant stereotypes. don’t let people around you make slanderous, sweeping generalizations of any people.
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