The Anglophile

Planet 51 review (‘aint got a witty title remark this time…)

I am taking a step away from the reviews about serious Hollywood blockbusters that either tickled my fancy, or got my blood pumping for all the wrong reasons.

Recently, I watched the animated flick Planet 51 which I found rather…interesting, to say the least. The reason why I watched this film was because I was recovering from a slight hangover from the previous night out and wanted to watch some simple TV that did not require much usage of my brain. Besides, there is no shame in an eighteen year old enjoying an animated film… (Yes, I did enjoy it!). But the shame comes from the fact that I went out to search and buy this DVD! Well, the honest truth is that I desperately was seeking any Dwayne Johnson film to watch my future husband and this fine specimen of manhood on my laptop screen. Initially, I was searching for the Tooth Fairy, but had no luck in HMV, only to get a brain wave and discover it in Entertainment Exchange the next day discounted by £1 from its sticker price of £7. Anyway, I decided to settle for just his voice in Planet 51.

However, what I found very strange (and may I add, a little unsettling as an avid fan and expert of the film industry) was that Johnson was voicing the character of a white guy with conventional blonde hair and blue eyes!

Hmm…good or bad?

You decided!

Let me just give you my ‘on the fence’ opinion.

Good – for once we are witnessing a Hollywood produced and consumed (animated) film where the actor is not being typecast. Johnson himself, on the Ellen DeGeneres show, took humour from this point which I found very refreshing at the time I watched the interview clip in question on YouTube.

BUT…

Bad – when I took some time to think between the margins and use my knowledge of racial prejudice and representations in the media from A Level Media Studies and my first year doing a Film Studies degree (…don’t worry, I won’t get too deep), I thought possibly whether Johnson had “sold out” to the “white crowd” now that he has made it as a big Hollywood star…

Now, I’m not going to go into details about how pissed the WWE fans are that he has completely ditched them and his persona ‘The Rock’ for fame and fortune in “Hollywierd”. This is just a point I am making… But, does this not all prove how Hollywood and the film industry as a white male institution is just quite simply racist? Before you start, I’m not talking about uses of the “N” word and so on…but favouring a particular race and only believing, relying and enforcing that superior race to sell films, in this case. Planet 51 proves how not even a successful actor of colour can fulfil a role that incorporates his real and ‘reel’ personas, and also proves that they cannot even allow an ANIMATED!!! (fictional, un-real) character of colour as the main character(s) of a Hollywood film. And do not start gassing about “The Princess and the Frog” and how she was a black Disney princess.

Do not even get me started on the hidden Disney racial interpretations in that film, as well as the flop gross budget in the box office!