The Movie : Charlie Chan

Asian American have been depicted as malicious, sneaky and evil minded others that always threaten to rape innocent white maidens. They are thought of as not being able to speak proper English and in the American cinema there are three formulaic traditions regarding the way Asians are depicted in movies, according to Jun Xing: the yellow peril, the Madame Butterfly and the Charlie Chan stories (Jun, Xing. Asian America Through the Lens. Alta Misa Press. 1998.

In the following paragraphs I will be analyzing Charlie’s moral personality. Charlie’s moral development characteristics will be deeply analyzed. His characteristics will be assessed and compared to Kohlber’s theory of moral development. I will be giving examples of Charlie’s moral characteristics in relation to Kolhber’s moral theory. The reasons of why the character is not in any of the other stages of development will also be discussed. I will also make comparison of my observations to the different stages of moral development in Charlie’s character. Charlie’s moral behavior differs throughout the movie and goes thru continuous changes.

In the movie “Little Buddha”, a boy named Jesse is thought to be a reincarnation of Lama Dorje, a Buddhist teacher. A group of monks, led by Lama Norbu, show up at Jesse’s house and talk to his parents about their discovery. Jesse was gifted a book on Buddhism by the monks, which led to Jesse’s fascination with Buddhism. Jesse’s parents seem cautious about the whole situation, but they allow Jesse to learn Buddhism.

The movie ‘Her’ is the story about Theodore Twombly (Joaquin Phoenix), a man who develops a relationship with Samantha (Scarlett Johansson), an intelligent computer operating system personified through a female voice. At the beginning of the film, Theodore is completely inept when it comes to how to make relationship with person, specifically women. However, after he gets to know Samantha, an OS program, a feeling of true love develops inside of Theodore’s mind. Then he realizes how he was fatuous in his past. Throughout the film, the director (Spike Jonze) uses five distinct color schemes to correspond Theodore’s feeling and situation.

culturally inaccurate. At the time, Asians were still very much underrepresented in film and many

Despite the fact that Asian Americans have been in Hollywood for decades, there are very few positive representations of them in film. More often than not, they’ve been depicted as stereotypical caricatures, and more specifically, as foreigners who can’t speak grammatically correct English. Moreover, the negative representations of Asian Americans in film has perpetuated certain misconceptions about their culture. Chan is Missing (1982) calls for more genuine representations of Asian American identities through its cast of complex characters and defiance of Asian stereotypes. The film also urges its viewers to critically think about their own notions of identity through the use of several recurring themes and filmmaking techniques.

Since the first half of the 19th century, Asian Americans have been involved in the media industry when the original “Siamese Twins” Chang and Eng Bunker became naturalized citizens of America. Roles in television and other media were scarce for Asian Americans, only available roles were very stereotypical. Early Asian American actors such as Bruce Lee and Sessue Hayakawa could only land stereotypical supporting roles in prime time television. While minority actors have progress through the years, Asian Americans in the media remains an issue. The misrepresentation of Asians Americans that continues the tendency of stereotypes and type casting. To this day, Asians Americans take on roles that tends to portray the stereotypical roles. Asian Americans becomes easily targeted and exploited from such representation. “Model Minority” Stereotype is consistently express through advertising and primetime television; Asians being nerdy: having type casted into professional roles ignoring real values and cultures, Asian women: seen as hypersexual, erotic, cunning and dangerous, Asian men: dangerous, unfriendly, master of martial arts, undesirable male partners and weak. Media representation of Asian Americans in America’s media history, continue to influence and reproduce dominant Americentric impressions, rather than the true authentic depiction of Asian American culture and behavior. Americentric stereotypes of Asian American women and men has led to limited roles of Asian Americans

Anna May Wong, the most prominent Asian actress of the early twentieth century, has a filmography filled with “Dragon Lady” and “Madame Butterfly” roles. When criticized for perpetuating stereotypes with her roles as doomed lovers and temptresses, she refuted she had little choice if she wanted to find roles, and she also wished American film would expand Asian roles beyond harmful stereotypes (Wang, 2012). She also could not take any leading roles; miscegenation laws of the time did not allow Asian actresses to be opposite a white leading man. Moreover, despite no shortage of Asian-American actors looking for a role, Asian roles would go to white actors. The Chinese peasant woman O-lan in The Good Earth, a film adaption of Pearl S. Buck’s novel, was played by white actress Luise Rainier in yellow face with her eyes taped

Asian American actors in modern media deal with whitewashed film and television, underrepresentation in major works, and casting in stereotypical roles. These three problems are rooted in the history of Asian American actors in film and television, and have been perpetrated by stereotypes that continue to this day. The purpose of this memo is to examine the modern industry of film and television through the eyes of Asian American actors, viewing the stereotypes and stigmas these actors face, and looking forward to see what can be done by casting directors to reduce harmful stereotyping and increase diversity in film and television.

The view of POCs (People of Color) within mainstream media has always been strewed. From the roles of Flora Robson as a Haitian maid in Saratoga Trunk to Mickey Rooney as I. Y. Yunioshi, the view of POCs in American popular culture has always been warped to portray an often negative or demeaning stereotype that appeases the white audience of American pop culture. Although many races are negatively impacted by the conceptions of the white American public, the portrayal of Asian American stereotypes in television has especially given an illusion to the American public on what to assume when facing an Asian American. Even with the growth of the Asian American voice in television and the increase in representation through new shows such as “Fresh Off the Boat” and “Marco

The movie crash is a phenomenal movie, which reflects our society in an uncomfortable way. Although, we have come a long way from the era of slave trade and open racism, we are not where we want to be yet, with regards to these issues, but we have made huge progress. The movie reflects a number of silent issues plaguing our society, such as mistrust, stereotyping, profiling, racism, and clash of cultures. The plot of this movie causes us to reflect deeply about our societal and personal values, it raises questions of if we are guilty of the same, and if we are doing enough to address these issues. In a brief review, Goyette (2011) of Boston colleges reported that the movie promotes racial awareness, thrusts race under the magnifying glass and

Instead of Hollywood casting actual Asian- Americans, Hollywood chooses to cast white actors and use a makeup effect called “yellow face”. The most popular depictions of Asians were fictional characters referred to as “Charlie Chan” and “Fu Manchu”. This method is still used today and has dated back from 1915. When an Asian American gained a role it was usually a martial artist or a racially demeaning role.

The movie Rosewood had a lot of impact on black and white people throughout the century. Rosewood stems from a small town located in central Florida. It co-existed with 120 people, mostly blacks who owned and farmed the surrounding land. On New Year's Day of that year, Fanny Taylor, a white woman in the nearby predominantly white town of Sumner, ran out of her house screaming, bruised and battered, claiming that a black man had assaulted her. In fact, the beating had been at the hands of her white lover. Fanny had lied so that her husband would not find out about her adultery. Fanny claimed that an escaped black convict from a local chain gang had done this. This led to tension and resentment to all the local townspeople of Sumner. The

     Another stereotype depicted in the film was that every Asian character spoke flawed English. Not one single person through the film had a perfect grasp of the English language. This provides the comical relief in the film as any Asian man at any time could pronounce a word wrong or use the wrong word to the bemusement of the film watchers. The broken English that is used by the Asian characters in this film seem to heighten or display the fact that the Asian characters have visible flaws. The Americans never have to display such flaws, in fact the only part of the movie where an American attempts to spoke Japanese it is completely flawless, without hesitation or pause.

1928 and 1929 were important years for Los Angeles-born Chinese actress Anna May Wong. News reports about her Hollywood movies decreased, instead, according to an American gossip columnist visiting Europe during Wong’s tenure, she was “acclaimed by nobility” in several European newspapers (Petersen, 2014). Severely limited by the noxious roles she was offered in Hollywood, which misrepresented Asian women, Wong left the United States for Europe (Vechten, 2003). She then spent two years in Germany, England and France, where she gained global attention and worldwide stardom. This special period in Wong’s life was also a sensitive period for Chinese immigrants and all the ethnic actors and actresses in Hollywood, who barely made livings under