Disney's Frozen: As in frozen in the past

Next up on our list of the 10 highest grossing movies since President Obama took office is "Frozen" from Disney.  A late addition to the list, Frozen is now the highest grossing animated movie of all time, currently occupying the number 5 spot on the list with $1.143 billion in revenue. (Boxofficemojo.com)  Moving up our list with a bullet, Frozen wasn't even in the top 10 when this blog started a few weeks ago.  One key to its success is Disney released Frozen in 41 languages (R. Keegan, "LA Times"), exhibiting their understanding of the importance of international revenues.

First the good: it's a fun film with a strong female protagonist and some beautiful music.  Disney hired Jennifer Lee to adapt the Hans Christian Andersen story "The Snow Queen" for Frozen.  Disney then hired a veteran composer (Christophe Beck) and veteran Broadway singer (Idina Menzel) to give the movie a highly polished musical production.  Casting Kristin Bell in the protagonist role (Anna) capitalized on her star power and showed off her surprisingly strong singing voice.

Now the bad: it's virtually all white, except for the voicing of some non-human trolls.  The movie is set in a fictitious land - Arendelle.  There is a no justifiable reason the movie needed to exclude people of color.  Incredibly, this is a pattern with Disney.  Of the movies reviewed so far for this blog, Disney has had the worst ratios of non-white actors/characters.

Quite coincidentally, this week the owner of the Los Angeles Clippers professional basketball team was recorded criticizing his girlfriend for "associating with black people." (TMZ)  Apparently Mr. Sterling is also counseling his cross-town neighbors at Disney about their movie casting decisions.

Transformers 3: Mostly White Male Machines

"Transformers: Dark of the Moon" (T3) marks the third installment in the popular Transformers series.  T3 made $1.124 billion in worldwide sales, placing it 5th on the list of highest grossing movies since President Obama took office (Boxofficemojo.com).  T3 is the only movie by Paramount/Dreamworks to crack the top 10.

T3 brings back almost all of the main characters and actors from the previous two installments.  This leads back to the previously discussed dilemma of non-original work: once a character is cast, it is highly uncommon to recast it with an actor of another race.  But what about new characters?  Is there some ratio of whites to non-whites that is determined in the original work?

For those who have yet to see a Transformers movie, the Transformers are alien machine beings fighting a war among themselves.  Earth becomes just another battleground.  Shia LaBeouf's Earthling character (Sam Witwitki) is befriended by one of the machines, and Witwitki becomes involved in the many battles between the Autobots (good guys) and the Decepticons (bad guys).

So how about cast diversity?  The second iteration of Transformers received an enormous black eye when two of the Autobots - "Skids" and "Mudflap" - were acted out with exaggerated ebonics.  The two characters were labeled as "racist caricatures" (huffingtonpost.com) by some, leading director Michael Bay apologize and strike the characters from the theatrical release of T3.  Unfortunately, T3 swings so far in the other direction as to eliminate all but one non-white Transformer. There are still no female Transformers.

To be fair, there are some non-white live-action actors in the movie.  But their numbers are few and certainly none of these actors are top-billing or represent characters in positions of authority.  That is unless you count Leonard Nemoy as a Vulcan.

Skyfall: The Old Dog Learns Some New Tricks

The latest in the long-running James Bond series is "Skyfall," garnering #6 on the list of highest grossing movies since President Obama took office.  As Sony's lone entry in the top 10, Skyfall earned $1.109B (Boxofficemojo.com), with an impressive 72.5% coming from international sales.  Could cast diversity have played a part in Skyfall's very strong international appeal?

In this, the 23rd episode of "shaken, not stirred," Daniel Craig plays the part of James Bond for the 3rd time.  One of the key tenets of the Bond series is its namesake character womanizing his way around the world on behalf of the British secret service (MI6).  However, since Daniel Craig took over in 2006 (IMDB), women have played much more important roles.  For example, Judi Dench reprises her role as "M," the leader of MI6, a role previously only played by men.  The character of Eve Moneypenny is also a strong and competent woman.  Skyfall's women are a far cry from the many weak and incompetent women portrayed in early Bond films.

But this blog is about racism; how does Skyfall stack-up?  There is far more racial diversity throughout this cast than in the other movies reviewed on this blog.  While the leading actor and actress are both white, the characters that might be best described as co-supporting actresses are non-white.  The "Bond Girl" is played by Berenice Marlohe, whose father is Asian.  The biggest breakthrough, however, is Naomie Harris as Eve Moneypenny.  Harris is of African descent.  The role of Moneypenny has only previously been played by white women.

Sony deserves a great deal of credit for breaking prior conventions with non-original material.  Was this why Skyfall did so well internationally?  It's hard to say.  What can be said is Sony took some chances other studios didn't and enjoyed a tremendous financial success.

The Dark Knight Rises: Diversity Not Rising

Number seven on the list of highest grossing movies since President Obama took office is "The Dark Knight Rises" ("TDKR"), the 2012 release from Warner Bros., which earned $1.085 billion in worldwide box-office revenue.  TDKR is the latest in the highly successful "Batman" series, and the 3rd movie in the series to feature Christian Bale as Bruce Wayne/Batman.  TDKR is, of course, non-original work.  And, like the other non-original movies reviewed in this blog thus far, the casting department at Warner Bros. remained consistent to the level of diversity, or lack thereof, of the previous Batman movies.  Even Morgan Freeman, the most prominent non-white actor in the series, stayed at number 7 in the IMDB cast list, the same position he occupied in the last film: "The Dark Knight."  While there are other non-whites in the cast, they play very minor characters - most with names like "SWAT in Dive Bar" or "Analyst #2."

So why care about this issue?  After all, the point of business in a capitalist society is to return an investment to the shareholders.  TDKR certainly did that.  But could it have done better?  According to a study performed at UCLA's Bunche Center for African American Studies, television shows with diverse leading cast members and writers draw larger audiences than those with less diversity.  The Bunche Center analyzed 1,000 shows across 67 cable and broadcast networks from the 2011-2012 season.  According the Bunche Center Director, Darnell Hunt, the study is one of the first of its kind.

TDKR ended with a teaser that, despite retiring Christian Bale and his character Bruce Wayne, the Batman series will continue.  Hopefully Warner Bros. reads the Bunche Center study before they go into production with the next Batman installment.