As a Greek person I find it fucking hilarious how clueless this comment is. Klelia is from Thessaloniki, which is to the north of the country which has a larger amount of "fairer" Greeks. Helen was, in the stories, from Sparta where people tend to be a lot swarthier but that doesn't mean there aren't plenty of fair skinned, blonde or even redheaded people from there either. Greeks are very varied in appearance, contrary to what everyone is saying in this discussion. Klelia looks pretty much exactly how I'd imagine a blonde Greek girl to look down to her slightly sunkissed skin and muddy green eyes, my mother has the exact same kind of appearance and she's Greek Cypriot from Northern Cyprus, so even further south than Sparta.
It's ironic how in a topic that's throwing accusations about racism around people are incorrectly assuming we're all olive skinned with dark eyes and hair. Ask any Greek what Helen looked like, they'll show you someone who looks like Klelia. Casting a 40 year old black woman is just a very odd thing to do, I don't like how people immediately assume racism is the driving force behind questioning it.
I'm more annoyed that Nolan is directing the movie than the castings, he lacks any warmth and the movie is ugly and muted. None of these things resonate with the stories I was raised with or the culture we share with it which is really disappointing. People don't tend to view us through a modern lens just romanticising our history and mythology... They could at least get a tiny bit of it correct. A lot of Greek people feel marginalised and ignored when stuff like this happens.
I’m not saying that there are no ‘fair-skinned’ Greek people. I know for a fact that is not the case. I’m just willing to bet that the person searched for the most ‘white-passing’ Greek person they could find.
Totally agree with you on the directing btw. It would be great if Hollywood could focus more on accuracy when it comes to period pieces, even if the events were fictional.
I’m aware of Helen’s description but my point is that these people hardly argue in good faith. The fact that Helen is not portrayed accurately means jack shit because the movie is not at all accurate. It is about the fact that a black woman has a prominent role. If they casted a white actress with, for example, a heavy Australian accent there would be hardly any complaints.
Also: White supremacists ultimately consider anyone who is not Anglo-Saxon/Scandinavian as non-white. Not even a century ago Italians, Germans, Irish, etc. were not white.
"The fact that Helen is not portrayed accurately means jack shit because the movie is not at all accurate. It is about the fact that a black woman has a prominent role. If they casted a white actress with, for example, a heavy Australian accent there would be hardly any complaints."
BS, people are shitting on other aspects of the movie, like the armors and giant men.
Also, in plenty of other european stories movies, white actors were called out for not fitting roles.
Since when we are using white supremacists concepts as the standard?
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u/JR21K20 13d ago
They picked the whitest Greek woman they could find didn’t they?