Over the years, Scarlett Johansson has become one of the most successful and respected actresses in Hollywood. However, one of the biggest mishaps of her professional life has continued to haunt her career. Although she has brought about a lot of change when it comes to how women are portrayed onscreen, especially when it comes to the superhero genre, she took part in quite an archaic practice.
In her 2017 film, Ghost in the Shell, the actress was seriously criticized for playing the role of a character that should have been played by an Asian actor. While for years, this mistake has followed her career, there may be more to the reason why the film ended up failing.
If fans and critics are to be believed, the controversy surrounding the movie wasn’t the only reason why it ended up bombing.
Scarlett Johansson’s Unforgivable Error
In 2017, Scarlett Johansson starred in the live-action adaptation of the 1995 classic, Ghost in the Shell. Originally based on a manga of the same name, the animated film was culturally significant in many ways, influencing many other mangas at the time. Having significantly helped in establishing the cyberpunk theme that has become so popular in mainstream media, it is not surprising that the beloved story was adapted into live-action.
However, fans were quite surprised when the director and the cast of the movie were announced. Although there is no denying that Rupert Sanders could have done an excellent job, audiences were not happy to know that Johansson had been cast in the role of their beloved protagonist. Considering the setting of the movie is set in Japan, and the main character’s name is Motoko Kusanagi, audiences were not sure why the film did not just cast a Japanese actress in the role instead of the Avengers actress.
The rest of the cast showcased a similar pattern, which caused fans of the original works to get extremely upset. For years, Johansson has been criticized for taking the role and the contribution she had to Hollywood’s whitewashing of Asian characters. Although there is no denying that such publicity did not help the performance of the movie, there may have been more to the reason why it ended up failing in the first place.
Oftentimes, if the movie has redeeming qualities and is able to make up for big mistakes, fans are not as brutal. However, there is more than enough conversation surrounding the movie to know that it had many problems that were not related to the race of its lead actress.
Ghost in the Shell—A Lot More Than Whitewashing?
There have been many conversations surrounding what exactly caused Ghost in the Shell to have a rating as low as 42% on Rotten Tomatoes. Putting aside the casting aspect of it all, there is no denying that the movie had a lot of problems that hindered critics from rating it higher than what it ended up getting. In a Reddit conversation surrounding the same, one fan put it best, stating that the movie died on cutting room floors.
There was a lot going for it, having an excellent story and source material that was legendary in its own way. However, it had a very odd formula of when it stayed on the path set by the original work, and when it decided to do its own thing. Many viewers have criticized the director, Rupert Sanders, for his style of direction in the film, being extremely erratic and unpredictable in the worst ways possible.
Many called it a shallow and poor attempt at capturing the essence of the cyberpunk genre, being a betrayal of everything that was good about the original works and downright disrespectful in the eyes of many fans. Some even believe the characters to be two-dimensional, adding little to the story.
The film is simply too focused on building an aesthetic rather than understanding what makes the cyberpunk genre so popular; being the meeting point of technological evolution and human emotions at their peaks.
Ghost in the Shell is available for streaming on Prime Video.
