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In other news, I am sick to death of political-correctness. I find it disconcerting every time I watch a Shakespeare play set in England during the 14th or 15th century and the Duke of Gloucester or some other royal is a person of color. When Laurence Olivier played Othello, he had to paint his face (it was unnecessary for James Earl Jones, obviously), so shouldn't the black actor apply white (peach or salmon?) make-up to at least give the impression of historical correctness? You say I'm overreacting? Then isn't this the same issue in reverse?

 

She was probably chosen because she has shown she can be  a box office action star who can make them money....end of story.

I can't think of any Japanese actresses that are famous enough in the US/worldwide to play the lead role in a movie like this. So someone like Scarlett Johansson is an ideal choice. Apart from being good looking and well known she's also done some sci-fi action movies recently (Lucy, Avengers etc) and that's probably the same audience that the movie producers want to attract for Ghost In The Shell.

Yep......'nuff said.

Well, I think most moviegoers care about both. But it's a fact that it's very hard to have a hit if you don't have a famous star in the leading role. And they need the film to be a hit because these kinds of movies are expensive to make. You need to recoup at least a hundred million dollars before you even start making a profit.

Japanese creators and companies are happy to sell their intellectual property to Hollywood studios because they get a ton of cash. These remakes only happen after the original Japanese creators give permission and get paid. They only care about money. Come over to Japan sometime and you will see what I mean. They use anime characters to sell junk food, pachinko slot machines, video games, sexualized products like mousepads with breasts etc. Japanese anime creators and companies have zero integrity (except for maybe Studio Ghibli).

And it wouldn't necessarily be better if it was made in Japan with an all Japanese cast. I mean look at the live action Attack On Titan movies or the live action Kiki's Delivery Service movie. All Japanese staff and cast and the movies were terrible.

I don't think many American moviegoers know or even care if it's originally from Japan or not. They just want to see attractive actors and actresses, lots of action scenes and cool special effects.

And that's the unfortunate thing about this whole thing: there isn't any creative/artistic/economic risk involved, and there isn't as much room for new talent to become big superstars as there was back in the day. Of course everything's about the money, but it should not get too much in the way of creative freedom and deliver something legitimately good. Besides, I'm not bothered in seeing what might be yet another piece of sh*t live-action adaptation (because history shows it to be the case). So, if I see from now on any debate on a movie in regards to 'whitewashing', 7 times out of 10 the movie looks to be sh*t to me, personally.

Well honestly, for this character not a lot of acting is really needed. The character is not very emotional, she has a very cold personality. But the role will have a lot of physical challenges (although I guess they will use stunt doubles and CGI for that).

Unfortunately I think the final result will be closer to the Resident Evil movies rather than the original Japanese movies and TV shows. But hopefully I'm wrong.

I think there was, but I'm not entirely sure since I don't know when they first announced Johansson is playing Kusanagi so...

Not even close to Sterling Holloway, though.  Only Idris Elba and Kingsley fared well among the voice overs imo.  

 

He's doing Dr Strange currently......Depp turned down the role from what I have read.

Personally I like Cumberbatch...an excellent actor , but certainly he nor anyone else is right for every part.

 

But as someone mentioned above this is all about the money...so they are not going to hire a nobody for the lead role unless they have a well known supporting cast to carry the film and they hope the newcomer will become a star.

 

Big budget action / superhero films are all about fantasy anyway....do we really want to see ordinary looking people in them...? Look at all the Avenger films, etc...these are box office draws....it's that simple.

Even Deadpool, an unconventional 'hero' film has Ryan Reynolds and not some average acting Joe.

It's a no brainer.