MovieChat Forums > Death Note (2017) Discussion > For all people who are anticipating this...

For all people who are anticipating this...


... you do know that this is made by the director of The Blair Witch (2016), written by the authors of Immortals and Fantastic 4, stars black actor as L and 23 years old guy mostly seen in melodramas as Light, and produced mostly by the people who has absolutely or almost absolutely no experience in producing movies?

Nolan, I love you forever!

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He also directed You're Next and The Guest which were phenomenal films. They scrapped a lot of writers' draft. It final draft was written by Slater and revised by Kyle Killen.

Also, Slater had nothing to do with the Fantastic Four movie, the studio changed the script and still gave him writing credits.

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Well, Slater should have sued the studio, then. Because from now and till the end of his days this trash movie will be a black spot on his entire career.

Nolan, I love you forever!

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by gstards ยป 1 day ago (Sat Jan 21 2017 13:17:12)
IMDb member since January 2013

... you do know that this is made by the director of The Blair Witch (2016), written by the authors of Immortals and Fantastic 4, stars black actor as L

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand... I stopped reading.

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I guess you are also pretty fine with Idris Elba playing Roland in The Dark Tower, aren't you?

Nolan, I love you forever!

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Nope! I don't really have a problem with the casting itself. I'm more worried about the film itself.

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But the casting is a major part of a film. Can you name one great movie with bad casting?

Nolan, I love you forever!

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How do you know this is a bad casting already?

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By the look on the actor. You just can't make work some things. L is supposed to look the was he was presented in anime. Some people just supposed to be portrayed in definite way.

By all of this I want to write: L should be write, and even more, pale, to portray just how big the amount of his brain work is that it almost makes him sick.

Nolan, I love you forever!

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Oh, look... another one: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1241317/board/thread/263914538

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It looks like you don't have a lot of supporters there. *oops*

Nolan, I love you forever!

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It looks like you don't have an actual argument. *oops*

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My argument is that L is supposed to be pale white because it shows how much hard brain work he does every day and because of that he has this pale look. He even had black pouches under his eyes. How is this supposed to look on a black actor?

Nolan, I love you forever!

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My argument is that L is supposed to be pale white because it shows how much hard brain work he does every day and because of that he has this pale look. He even had black pouches under his eyes. How is this supposed to look on a black actor?


This comment is an example of a racist who doesn't even realize that he is racist. He lives so far away from anyone who isn't white that he asks a question about black people as if they are imaginary characters from fantasy novels.

It's this same kind of person that lives with this idea that the whole world centers around white people.

It's this same kind of person that makes obvious double standards like moaning about a black actor playing L but having no problems with the whitewash of Light Yagami even though there was no excuse to not hire an Asian American actor to play Light Yagami.

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Gosh, I'm not a racist. I absolutely, on 100% love Morgan Freeman, Neil DeGrass Tyson, Denzel Washington, Chiwetel Ejiofor, David Gyasi, Eddie Murphy, Will Smith, Jamie Foxx, Lupita Nyong'o, Whoopi Goldberg, and I'm open for the new ones. They are one of my favorite actors, and I'm perfectly fine with all of them. It usually doesn't even affect me when I watch a movie which color is actor's skin, if this is not connected to the character's inner world. If I was a racist, do you think I would EVER write this?

My problem with casting black actor to portray L is not because he's black and I blindly hate black people because they are so. It's because his look is supposed to mirror his way of life. His pale look is supposed to show something I've wrote about like two or three times here already.

By the way, will you also call a millions of people who are claiming that Idris Elba is a total miscast for the role of Roland in The Dark Tower "racists"?

Nolan, I love you forever!

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I don't mean to interfere, but you are completely missing the other poster's point. It's not so much that you're racist for opposing black L, it's that you're racist for doing that while NOT opposing white Light.

Unless you actually do. Now would be a great time to clear this up.


And so Governor Devlin, because even the cost of freedom can be too high, I REFUSE your pardon!

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Actually, in my original post above, I've made it pretty clear that Light's actor is also miscast in my opinion.

Nolan, I love you forever!

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I see your point but I don't think you see his. In a movie with a limited time to tell it's story, it's more effective to visually illustrate a bookish, basement dwelling shut-in using a pasty skinned white kid rather than someone dark skinned. Yes, there are bookish, basement dwelling shut-ins of all color but the visual aspect would be missing.

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My argument is that L is supposed to be pale white because it shows how much hard brain work he does every day and because of that he has this pale look. He even had black pouches under his eyes. How is this supposed to look on a black actor?


You know that's pretty racist, right? Are you saying people of African American descent can't exhaust their brain and have pouches around their eyes? You don't think actors of African American descent are capable of creating that characterization? Come on bro, that's just wrong.

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No, I don't. It's movies, not real life, they need symbols. I'm not saying anything about reality here. We're talking about the movie. Which needs to portray L the way he was supposed to be portrayed. It's me who should write "c'mon, people", actually. I'M NOT A RACIST. You can look up for the list of black actors I admire, I've wrote about them in another post on this thread. I just have my reasons to think this is a bad casting.

Nolan, I love you forever!

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By the way, I think Neil DeGrass Tyson is one of the most amazing media scientists out there, and Morgan Freeman is one of the smartest actors on Earth.

Nolan, I love you forever!

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De Grasse is a self righteous, elitist ass who talks down to and belittles people of faith, because they don't share his OPINIONS. That is the true sign of a moron.

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It's not just people of faith - he talks down to EVERYONE.

Heaven forbid someone (or half a country) gets excited about a solar eclipse, there he is on Twitter talking about how they happen all the time, just not where most people can see them. Completely missing the point as to why people are excited.

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I guess being a pompous, condescending ass makes him money. I agree about the eclipse. I really didn't give a hoot about it but why deride the people who did? Let them have a special moment. Lord knows we need 'em.

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Well you didn't mention light s actors race like you did with L.

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Just like I don't care if Scarlett Jo is playing the Major in Ghost in the Shell, (my favorite anime series), I don't care that a black actor is playing L. If they're good actors, that's not going to matter in the slightest.

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So I haven't read these, only watched the anime, but I'm confused as to why folks are griping at people being angry over the casting of L but not Light... In asking why people are not upset Light is not Japanese... I know the story (at least anime) takes place in Japan but Light doesn't look Asian at all....he has blonde hair for crying out loud, so who cares if he's not played by an Asian? And regarding L, did anyone get pissed when the main Anime chars weren't black, only the supporting roles? If you like the anime, just watch the f'ing movie...as long as they do a good job, who cares what ethnicity they are. I don't. If you're too pissed about the color/race of any of the actors, then don't watch it.

I can however understand concerns about if an actor has the ability to portray the chars, and in this case I have concerns about who they've cast as both L and Light, and it's got $#!+ to do with their ethnicity. Light is not slick-looking nor potentially evil-looking enough (he's too...in the middle) and L doesn't appear quirky, reclusive, nor socially awkward enough ...but hopefully both are way better than my first impression of them from their photos on IMDB and they'll change that up a great deal for the actual movie... We'll see though.

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To be fair, Light Yagami's hair color would be characterized as "auburn-brown." There are cultural reasons for it, and even if it's not natural, it is a popular dye color.

--
There's no such thing as the establishment. Everyone knows that!

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Well maybe my TV is jacked, as he sure looks like a dirty blonde when viewing him in his normal state, with bright red hair when he is in super-Kira mode. Either way, I don't take Light as the kind of guy who dyes his hair every other day.

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He says himself, he's very popular. And seriously what the hell is wrong with your TV?

--
There's no such thing as the establishment. Everyone knows that!

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No argument regarding his popularity, I agree...just not sure what that has to do with hair color (natural or dyed)...he is supposed to be a hot teen...popular guy with the ladies, so again, no argument there. Unless you meant that him being popular means he dyes his hair, which maybe, but I still say I don't see him as someone who worries over bothering to dye his hair in between his studies and creating a "better" world,etc...

I will stand corrected after pulling this back up in Netflix however, he def has brown hair. The lighting in the anime often casts his hair in slightly different colors though....in super-Kira mode it's red, anytime they are portraying L vs Kira it's RED (same way they change L's hair from black to blue), in semi-Kira mode it can appear more auburn/red, but I think that was intentional as Light is purposefully shaded more "red" when Kira's influence is most apparent (same thing happens to his eyes, but that's not his normal appearance), and in some conditions it does look a bit blonde (but after going back to review, I agree that is not the norm - was apparently remembering it incorrectly).

I still think that he is pretty Caucasian in appearance though, which was the main point I was trying to make...so, my apologies for any confusion by saying he's a dirty blonde.

Different Views of him:

Brown (Normal):
http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m297dgv96L1qcrsiy.jpg

Brown with highlights:
http://i1.ytimg.com/vi/BkPOynflWiE/mqdefault.jpg

Auburn / Red (Kira-influence):
http://img-cache.cdn.gaiaonline.com/c08789bd0b7897228f12ee2d031d2b10/http://i483.photobucket.com/albums/rr193/deathnote81/deathnote/light%20yagami/light355.jpg

Blonde (**Possible Spoiler**):
http://static1.comicvine.com/uploads/original/6/68616/1351865-light_animestocks_com__77.jpg

RED (super-Kira):
https://littledailyprophet.files.wordpress.com/2008/04/bscap0014.jpg

RED (L vs Kira moments):
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/Z5GWX2oV_xA/hqdefault.jpg

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Look, the funny thing about debating color is you never know what the other person is seeing: I could present this piece of art to you, and say "Here it is auburn"

http://www.deathnotenews.com/uploads/1/7/3/9/17393465/1671303_orig.jpg

but you never really know what the other person is seeing. You might disagree and say it's definitely brown (normal.)

We might have a similar disagreement over this picture.

http://tinyurl.com/zzls7ah

Or this one:
http://tinyurl.com/zlnsrao

This one!?:

http://tinyurl.com/hxdkm5a

(Look how much red is in it!) The problem with brown as a color, is that it requires, and is dominated by, the color red. So any shade lighter than this:

http://tinyurl.com/hvljdtl

is likely to elicit some level of disagreement. This optical illusion might explain it, some:

http://tinyurl.com/l5layez

I will say this though... here's Light from the live action version of Death Note:

http://tinyurl.com/zs5h5th

--
There's no such thing as the establishment. Everyone knows that!

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His features are typical Japanese not Caucasian. And you should watch more Japanese films and tv, coloring their hair is very popular there.

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Light like most Japanese media drawn/depicted characters has colored dyed hair. Even the style is indicative of the time and geography of Japan. A lot of Asians color their hair, it doesn't make them white by doing so.

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I just saw it and it's ok. There are things I liked about it and things I don't. I've seen the Japanese feature film when it came out and I unfortunately hated the casting especially of L, and tbh I think this is a better kind adaptation of the manga than the Japanese version. But one of the things I don't like here is the casting of Light he is such a pansy dork, not the Light in the manga/anime at all. I actually think the actor they got for L would've been better as Light. Light needs an arc where he transitions but he was always a cool aloof type of character, not the dork screaming like a Banshee we have here. The L actor I can see coming across as reserved nerdy yet coolly aloof and I can see him transitioning to something more sinister, but he is no L either. L needs to be weird living in his own little world like RainMan-ish and not athletic. The problem with live films of this sort is you need to get the right actor and write the right character as it was in the original source material. And they often get it wrong.

I haven't seen the tv live action series, is it any good?


Btw why do you have a problem with the casting of a Black actor as L but no issues with the casting of a white actor as Light? If you're going to have a problem, it should be for both not just a bias against Black actors specifically for a Western adapted film.

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I totally agree with what you said. I thought it was an "okay" movie... Nothing I would go around and recommend to everyone but it was a nice little flick. If you put your expectations low and don't spend your time comparing it to the manga, it does what it has to do.

I didn't have problems with L being black or Light being white (because well... It is an american adaptation). What I did have a problem with are the chosen actors. Especially L didn't fit at all the character from the manga, even personality wise. The L in the manga was arrogant in his way but stayed reserved and modest in his approach. He was sure confident about the fact that he was right but didn't express it like an asshole. In this movie, he simply came up as a pretencious prick whit this "I am right you are all wrong so I am superior" attitude. In the manga L was playing with Light's mind to make him admit everything subtlety and slowly. Here he just came to Light and affirmed right away "I know you are guilty now admit it". This is not how an investigation works and if he is a professional he's supposed to know that.

Anyway it was a fun one-time watch but I don't think i'll ever watch it again.

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I agree with your issues with L but for me Light was a major problem.

BTW, have you seen the Japanese live action tv series yet? Wondering what you thought of it if you did?

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