Coronavirus and a political boycott trip up 'Mulan' at the box office

Chinese moviegoers are not flocking to the live-action 'Mulan.'

There are those who say the first sign that Disney's live-action remake of Mulan was in trouble was when they decided to eliminate the beloved animated dragon Mushu voiced by comedian Eddie Murphy.

Even before the twin releases to theaters and on Disney Plus, the online streamer, there were concerns that Mulan was not going to live up to the hype despite an all-star, all-Asian and Asian American cast bolstered by the Disney studio's full-throttled support.

The new retelling of Mulan, an old Chinese myth, slogged through a few miscues along the way to its long-delayed, but highly anticipated, release last month.

A Disney executive on recently briefly addressed the controversy plaguing his studio's big budget, live-action reboot of Mulan, which has generated backlash for being filmed partly in China’s Xinjiang region. That’s where Uighur Muslims have been imprisoned en masse in so-called “re-education centers.”

“I’m not a box office predicator [or] prognosticator, but [the backlash] has generated a lot of publicity; let’s leave it at that,” said Christine McCarthy, The Walt Disney Co.’s chief financial officer, at a Bank of America Virtual 2020 Media, Communications and Entertainment Conference.

As an indicator, the blockbuster did not top the Chinese box office, pulling in a disappointing $23 million in its first weekend in China. Mulan earned only $1.47 million on its second Friday to bring its eight-day total to $31.17 million. 

Months before the movie opened (Sept. 4 on Disney+ and in theaters in the Chinese market) there were calls for a boycott from Hong Kong protestors (prime movie-going age group) beause of Mulan star Liu Yifei's  statement of support for Hong Kong police, and by extension, the Beijing communist government. 

When Mulan was released on Disney+, Hong Kong activist Joshua Wong tweeted, "This film is released today. But because Disney kowtows to Beijing, and because Liu Yifei openly and proudly endorses police brutality in Hong Kong, I urge everyone who believes in human rights to #BoycottMulan." That hashtag went viral.

That movement and boycott has gained momentum as the movie's general release date kept being postponed because of the coronavirus.

Speaking of COVID-19, Disney decided to go ahead and release their film despite not all of China's theaters not being able to open because of the pandemic.

READ: My short, short review of Mulan.

The backlash against Mulan gained even more traction after it was released in theaters and online at Disney-Plus when eagle-eye moviegoers watched the credits at the end of the movie. Disney thanked the government and officials of Xinjiang, China, the region where Uighur Muslims are being detained in mass internment camps, according to The New York Times.

Xinjiang, in western China, is home to about 11 million Uyghur people, "a predominantly Muslim ethnic minority that speak a language closely related to Turkish and have their own distinct culture," according to CNN. About one million Uyghurs are estimated to be detained in camps in the area, where they reportedly endure torture, abuse, political indoctrination, and forced labor. The Chinese government denies claims of abuse and says the camps are "vocational training centers" and necessary for preventing terrorism. 

Activists have used social media to spread the message that supporting Mulan is tantamount to being complicit in these human rights violations. 

Disney's head of finance, Christine McCarthy, responded to the controversy, saying that the criticism is overblown and that only small portions of the film were shot in Xinjiang.

"The real facts are that Mulan was primarily shot -- almost in entirety -- in New Zealand, said Disney's head of finance, Christine McCarthy, reports Deadline. "In an effort to accurately depict some of the unique landscape and geography of the country of China for this period drama, we filmed scenery in 20 different locations in China. It's common knowledge that, in order to film in China, you have to be granted permission. That permission comes from the central government."

"So, in our credits, it recognized both China and locations in New Zealand. I would just leave it at that, but it has generated a lot of issues for us."

Additionally, China's complex relations with neighboring countries has generated calls for boycotts in India, Singapore and South Korea.

As the backlash over Disney’s collaboration with Xinjiang began to pick up steam, days before the film's Sept. 11 opening in China, Chinese state media initiated a media blackout of coverage of the film robbing the Disney folks of any momentum in publicizing their $200-million movie, according to Reuters.

Chinese stars were cast in 'Mulan.'

The highly anticipated film was  tailored for the Chinese market, the second largest int he world after the U.S., by dropping the fantasy and music of the original 1996 cartoon version in order to become more culturally appropriate, spending months to study the costumes and architecture of the era and casting big-name Chinese stars such as Donnie Yen, Jet Li, Gong Li and Liu Yifei.

In the U.S., its draw among Asian Americans was that it was the first big-budget movie produced by a Hollywood studio with an all-Asian cast with an Asian theme. The first was Crazy Rich Asians which dispelled studio-held beliefs that movies with Asian lead actors couldn't draw multi-racial audiences.

Two other studio-driven movies, Flower Drum Song and the Joy Luck Club, preceded  Crazy Rich Asians but both were isolated blips in Asian American movie history. Neither of the films didn't  break box-office expectations to gain any follow-up momentum for other Asian American related films, a groundbreaking feat accomplished by Crazy Rich Asians. That breakthrough opened the doors for several other Hollywood productions with Asian themes with AAPI lead characters. 

To be sure, Mulan is a beautiful film and the action scenes are spectacular and is worth the a pleasant 2-hour escape from today's troubles. However, I'm not sure if that is enough to overcome the fortune-cookie dialogue the actors are saddled with. It's as if the writers had just watched "Little Grasshopper" get lectured to in the TV show Kung Fu and think all Chinese normally speak English in this stilted way.

Mulan's so-so performance thus far raises fears among AAPI Hollywood artists that feed the old, racist belief among the movie-making industry's decision-makers that Asian-led films aren't profitable.

We'll have to wait and see how Mulan does globally when more American theaters open their doors to see if the Disney can recoup its $200-million investment.

EDITOR'S NOTE: A word of caution, this article is news laced with opinion. Readers are encouraged to seek multiple news sources to formulate their own positions. 

UPDATED Sept. 21, 9:45 s.m. for clarity.

TGIF Feature: My short, short, short review of the live-action 'Mulan'

Iconic Chinese actress Gong Li as Xian Lang, the witch.

After waiting years and having the rug pulled out at least four times in anticipation of its opening. I couldn't wait any longer for the local theater to watch Mulan. So I oped to watch it in my coronvirus-inspired setting.

Directing: Niki Caro created a visually stunning film, but more attention should have been made towards character development. And, mo god, how did you ever accept the writing? (See below).

Action: Spectacular, but I inherently fantastic Chinese martial art movies and easily accept the jumping on rooftops and running horizontally.

Costumes: Beautiful. Bina Daigeler should get an Oscar nod and if she does walk up to the stage to receive a statue, I hope she brings along Gong Pan Pan, her Chinese fashion consultant. I can forgive them because they're creating for what looks best cinematically, not an anthropological thesis. But then again, I'm not a student of fashion history.

Acting: Adequate. Best in the non-action scenes. Problem was in the dialogue (See below). Gong Li came off the best as the Witch (I'd love to see her in more accessible films.) Jet Li and Donnie Yen had little to work with. Liu Yufei was OK as the Tom-boyish Mulan but she excelled in the action scenes.

Dialogue: Clunky. Did every line from authority figures -- the father, the captain, the witch -- have to have that "Kung Fu, grasshopper" kind of pronouncement? How many times do we have to get hit over the head about the importance of family? The dialogue felt like it was written by those folks who do the translations for the foreign language captions. The clumsy writing sounds like it was by writers and a director just learning about Chinese values (Turns out, that's all-too true.) or former writers of fortune cookie fortunes. It is hard to imagine that with the millions poured into this film Disney couldn't find an Asian writer.

In short: See it in theaters if you can. It's a beautiful film to immerse yourself in. Don't compare it to the 1996 animated version of Mulan, otherwise, you'll be disappointed. They are two separate movies and should be viewed as such. Best to watch it without expectations.

EDITOR'S NOTE: A word of caution, this is news sprinkled with opinion. Readers are encouraged to seek multiple news sources to formulate their own positions. 

Mulan release date announced; new poster & trailer released

UPDATED Dec. 5, 9:30 a.m. to include new trailer.

The live-action remake of Mulan hits theaters on March 27th, 2020 ahead of Disney's newest installment of the George Lucas-inspired space saga, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker.

Fans are still waiting to see if Mushu will have a part in the remake or not. His absence was another problem audiences had with early trailers but we hear that the dragon is part of the live-action film. 

The highly anticipated remake of Disney's 1998 original animated version hit some delays that involved extensive reshoots.

In preparation for the new trailer, Disney put out the new poster featuring Mulan, played by popular Chinese actress  Liu Yifei, in a fighting posture. Word is that the film will sacrifice the music featured in the original but will beef up the fighting scenes. 

The early trailer released four months ago drew some criticism from China over historical inaccuracies.

Liu Yifei also attracted criticism for her remarks against the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong drawing calls for a boycott of the film.

Directed by Niki Caro, the movie also stars Donnie Yen, Jet Li, Utkarsh Ambudkar, Yoson An, Xana Tang, Jason Scott Lee and Ron Yuan.

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Mulan: A star-studded cast for reboot; one controversial role remains unfilled

Gong Li and Jet Li are joining the 'Mulan' cast.

MULAN, the live-action remake, is off to a fitful start. On one hand, the casting of Chinese superstars generates tons of excitement, not only in the U.S. but in China as well. On the other hand, the fate of a popular character has fans up in arms.

Three huge Chinese stars are being secured for Disney's Mulan, joining Liu Yi Fei, an enormously popular star in her own right, who plays the lead role. Production is scheduled to start  in New Zealand in August followed by work in China.

Martial arts-legend Jet Li (The Expendables) and internationally acclaimed actress Gong Li (Memoirs of a Geisha) are set to play the Chinese Emperor and the movie's main villain respectively, in director Niki Caro's (Whale Rider) live-action version of Disney's 1998 animated adventure.

Last week, Donnie Yen (Rogue One, Ip-man franchise) was confirmed as a cast member to play the role of Commander Tung, a mentor and teacher to Mulan. His role was not in the original animated version of the movie.  

New Zealand-based Chinese/Vietnamese actress Xana Tang was also cast as Mulan's sister.

For Western audiences: The addition of Gong Li and Jet Li (not related) with Yen and Liu Yifei is comparable to Clint Eastwood and Meryl Streep joining Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and Jennifer Lawrence. You've got your older stars and you got your up-and-coming and wildly popular young actress -- you can get a sense of what Disney is doing. Each of the Chinese superstars could headline a movie on their own but to have them in the same film is a major, major coup for Disney and almost assures blockbuster status when the film opens in China, whose movie-going audiences rival - if it hasn't already surpassed - the U.S. as the No. 1 movie market.

Liu Yi Fei will play Mulan and Donnie Yen will play her mentor, Commander Tung.

Yen, who made quite an impression in his Hollywood debut in Rogue One as a blind martial artist who had command of The Force, is enormously popular in Hong Kong/China and the rest of Asia for his fighting and acting skills.

Jet Li is already well-known with Western movie fans, especially those who folow the martial arts genre. He's made a few Hollywood movies but the litany of mediocre roles has limited his box-office impact, but he's still big in Asia.

An esteemed actress in China, Gong Li has been credited with popularizing Chinese cinema in the English-speaking world, especially after winning the New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Supporting Actress for her portrayal as a hapless prostitute in Farewell My Concubine (1993), and the National Board of Review Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role in the American film Memoirs of a Geisha (2005). 

Gong’s Mulan role is a character which did not exist in the original animated film, and is said to replace the original’s ruthless Shan Yu, the king of the Huns.

There is one major role that has yet to be cast and it looks like it will never be filled: Li Shang. While the character serves as Mulan's commander-turned-love-interest in the animated original, it seems like he might not be making an appearance in the reboot. 

A tender moment between Mulan, posing as a boy, and Li Shang from Disney's first version of "Mulan."

After Yen was cast as a new character named Commander Tung as Mulan's mentor last week, a casting call for the film was uncovered revealing that Mulan's love interest will now be a solider named Chen Honghui.

According to the listing, Chen will serve as Mulan's "chief rival" who has a "mean, bullying streak to him." However, after he realizes that Mulan is actually a woman, those "intense feelings of rivalry" eventually turn into love. Meanwhile, the website Backstage.com shares that Honghui's part will be a lead role in which casting directors are looking for someone in their 20s who is "strapping, cocky and handsome" and can speak "fluent English and Mandarin Chinese."

It looks very much like Li Shang is being replaced with a more traditional love interest. Whether or not Disney's animators deliberately intended Li Shang to be confused about his sexual identity doesn't matter -- that's the way people have been interpreting the character and that's the perception held by the legion of upset fans who made Li Shang their bisexual icon.

It didn't take long for fans to voice their strong opinions about the recast, as fans have long considered Li Shang to be a "bisexual icon" for falling in love with Mulan when he thought she was a man. Alas, it seems like this isn't the only change the live-action film will make.

Still unknown - at least to us outsiders - is whether the new movie will be a musical like its cartoon 1998 predecessor. Would the popularity of the Disney original still rub off on the new version if they exclude such classics, including “I’ll Make a Man Out of You,” “Reflection,” and “A Girl Worth Fighting For?”

After initially saying that the upcoming Mulan wouldn’t be a musical, director Niki Caro later told the Los AngelesTimes that the film could include the tracks of the 1998 film’s legendary soundtrack. The casting of Chinese actress/pop singer Liu Yi Fei for the lead, it was thought that Caro was definitely leading towards a musical. However, with production to start in August, that announcement has yet to be made.

Because of the lengthy time it took to cast the lead role, literally auditioning a thousand actresses, the release date was put off from this year to March, 2020.

That's still a long way off and anything can still happen. Barring any major changes - and they would have to be catastrophic - Mulan will be the second all-Asian cast movie made and released by a Hollywood studio in recent years. Crazy Rich Asians, based on the novel of the same name and helmed by director Jon M. Chu which is now in post-production, will premiere in August of this year.

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RIP Li Shang

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Awards season means the return of the Anna Awards

Best Picture goes to Rogue One: A Star Wars Story by casting three Asian actors in prominent roles. Above, the Rogue One crew didn't include a single white male (See below).

IT'S AWARDS SEASON for the entertainment industry and once again, Asian/Americans and Pacific Islanders have mostly been overlooked for the best known awards for the Oscars, Emmy's and Tony's. 

Hence, the Anna Awards returns for its third installment. The awards below are named after Anna May Wong, a pioneer Asian/American actress who - even back then in the start of the motion picture industry - was conscious of the stereotypes Hollywood was perpetuating with its portrayal of Asian men and women and turned down roles that would reinforce those stereotypes.

This is the third year of the awards given to the performances on stage, the silver screen and on television. The categories are whimsical ones that I just made up which I get to do since I'm judge, jury and the majority vote in determining who is deserving based on their performance in 2016.

Drumroll, please ...

From left: Donnie Yen, Jiang Wen and Riz Ahmed.

Best Asian/American motion picture
For this category, we had to stretch a bit because so few movies prominently feature AAPI characters. Even though they were not in the lead, three Asian/American actors formed the core rebel team in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story. Donnie Yen, Jiang Wen and Riz Ahmed had key roles in the sci-fi storyline started by George Lucas. Outside of the fact they formed the majority of the rebel team -- they were were gay, bad ass and non-stereotypical. Although they were not the lead actors, they managed to lend unusual depth and conflict to their characters that we rarely see in these space swashbucklers. Rounding out the team of five was the lead character Jyn Ersois (British actress Felicity Jones) and Cassian Andor (Latino actor Diego Luna). A lesson to Hollywood: The fact there wasn't a white male among them did not hurt the box-office appeal as audiences flocked to the theaters to watch the latest installment of the Star Wars franchise.


Best Director

Taika Waititi on the set of The Hunt for the Wilderpeople.

Taika Waititi is a Maori whose offbeat sense of humor is well-known in his native New Zealand. He used that sense of humor with an overlay of poignancy to make a small film about human beings and relationships, The Hunt for the Wilderpeople. It is a movie that wasn't widely seen but it should be seen by any minority director who doesn't want to slip into the basketfull of ethnic stereotypes. His next film moves him from the small human drama category into the superhero realm of big budgets and big action. He'll direct Aquaman, starring fellow Polynesian actor Jason Mamoa (Game of Thrones), who is half-Hawaiian.

Best Actor
Dev Patel in the motion picture Lion. Dev was nominated for Best Supporting Actor in the Golden Globes, which he didn't win because of the super-strong competition and he faces the same hurdles for Best Supporting Actor in the Academy Awards. I wondered about those nominations because anyone seeing the movie can clearly see that Patel was the main actor and if we were to get strict with the rules, he should have been entered in the Best Actor category. The studio, seeing the competition in that category, thought he stood a better chance (albeit, a slim one) in the supporting actor category. 

Best Actress
Lucy Liu in the TV series Elementary. She plays a smart, sassy and deep Dr. Watson to the erratic Sherlock Holmes played by Johnny Lee Hammer. Liu could have just been just another sidekick, but her Watson holds her own against Holmes and the long-running show gives Liu and the show's writers the time to portray a character with a depth rarely given to any character played by an Asian. 

Best Breakout Performance
2016 was quite a year for Riz Ahmed with roles on TV and movies it seemed that the British actor was everywhere. But it was his role in The Night Of, where he starts out as a frightened victimized student who is transformed into a tough, prison-hardened tattooed character. For his performance, he was nominated for a Screen Actors Guild award and may still get an Emmy nod for making us believe in his character as a student and as an ex-con.

Bad-ass Woman of the Year
With the presidential campaigns in 2016, along with the surge of #OscarsSoWhite in the entertainment field, actress Constance Wu stepped up and said all the things we were thinking, even, some say, it might hurt her growing career beyond her Fresh Off the Boat success. She decried the practice of white-washing that saw non-Asian actress cast in obviously Asian roles such as Scarlett Johansson in the upcoming Ghost in a Shell motion picture and Tilda Swinton in the Dr. Strange film. She was in the thick of Hillary Clinton's failed campaign for President and joining the Women's March in Washington, D.C. She is currently in negotiations for the lead role in the all-Asian cast for Crazy Rich Asians directed by John Chu.



Bad-ass Man of the Year
You would have to come up with something really spectacular to give this to anybody but Daniel Wu for his portrayal of martial artist Sunny in Into the Badlands. The Berkeley-born actor made his fame in Asia and came back to this actioned that takes place in a future dystopian America where guns don't work so inhabitants have to resort to various forms of martial arts, swords and fisticuffs.


Best Fight Scene of the Year

It stands to reason that the best fight sequence involves one of our Bad-ass winners. Since Constance Wu won on the basis of her efforts off-camera, that means Daniel Wu (no relation to Constance) was involved. The opening sequence in the premiere of Into the Badlands has one of the best choreographed fights we've since in a long time. It's not quite the breathtaking fight between Michele Yeo's and Zhang Ziyi's characters in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon; or the  sword fight in Akira Kurosawa's Sanjuro when Toshiro Mifune's samurai character, Sanjuro, found himself surrounded by about a dozen other swordsmen; but, it's a really, really good fight for TV. Fight choreographer used a lot of the fantastic Kung Fu acrobatics that made him so much in demand in China and Hong Kong flicks.

Promising newcomer(s)
For the first time, we have a tie in this category with three new actors who bear watching. Brandon Perea who plays the smart student in Netflix's surprise sci-fi hit "The OA,"  is half-Puerto Rican and half-Filipino, but all American. His character is named French, who is smart, head on right, the kind of guy who could be voted Mr. Popularity on campus, everybody likes him. Despite all that could lead to being the stereotypical social snob, it turns out he's a nice, sensitive guy. He's a leader-type that doesn't have to show his abs. This unusual show kind of sneaked up on everybody and Bang!, everybody got hooked. It just got renewed for a second season.

Auli’i Cravalho, for her voice-over portrayal of Moana in the animated musical feature of the same name. We might never have seen her in person in the movie, but despite that, she gave a life and energy to the lead character who, in fact, did look a little like the Hawaiian-born actress. Look for her to sing the Oscar-nominated title song "How Far I'll Go," written by Hamilton's Lin Manuel Miranda, during the Academy Awards.

Hayden Szeto who played the unrequited love interest in the movie, Edge of 17, opposite Filipina/American Hailee Steinfeld. The role could just have been of any race but Szeto won over the director and producer. He avoided the nerdy stereotype and played his character as an all-American guy who has a crush on Hailee. Kudos to him and to the director to not succumbing to the way-too-easy portrayal of the stereotype.

Best Stage Performance
This was a tough one. There were some very good performances by a number of artists on stage this year but if I had to narrow it to just one, ... I can't ... this will have to be another tie for the duet of Darren Criss and Lena Hall for their roles in Hedwig and the Angry Inch musical traveling show. Both of the Asian/American performers received rave reviews for the lead roles in that musical about a transexual glam rocker. While Criss played the lead role most of the time, Hall had the next most important male role of Itzak, and at times, took over Criss' role during his days off. Honorable Mentions go to Daniel Dae Kim in the King and I, Ali Ewoldt in Phantom of the Opera and Philiippa Soo in Hamilton.

Best Portrayal of an Asian by a non-Asian

From left: Scarlett Johansson, Tilda Swinton and Matt Damon don't deserve this award.

Hmmm. Lots of nominations here including Scarlett Johansson as Major in Ghost In A Shell, Tilda Swinton as the Ancient One in Dr. Strange, one can even make an argument that Matt Damon's role in The Great Wall should have been an Asian savior. Problem is, none of them deserve the "best" anything so we're leaving this category empty.

Is She, or Isn't She?
This award goes to the actor who no one would have guessed was AAPI. This year's award goes to Sharon Leal, who at first glance one would perceive to be African/American, but, it turns out, she is half Filipino. She loves her Filipino food, adobo and dinaguan, cooked by her mother. Unfortunately, her role on the CW's Supergirl is that of a Martian (Filipinos from Mars?) so she won't be able to draw on her ethnic heritage for her character.


TV show missing an Asian cast member

Asians are too rare in a setting that should have more Asian staff  since Sandra Oh, 2nd from left, exited the show.

ABC's long-running Grey's Anatomy hasn't been the same since Sandra Oh's Dr. Christina Yang left the cast. Not only did a favorite character leave a void, any urban hospital in America always has a strong presence of Asian staff as med-techs, nurses and doctors. The show is set in Seattle with a large AAPI population but you wouldn't know that watching the show. Produced by Shonda Rhimes, who has been outspoken about diversity in casting, should have an Asian character in a recurring role beyond the masked surgical nurse in the operating room.

Best Musical Performance in the Super Bowl

Well, since there is only one Super Bowl per year, it's pretty obvious the award for 2016 goes, hands down, to Bruno Mars for his performance when he and his dancers faced off with Beyonce and her Formation army of women. Mars more than held his own as the trio belted out Mars' hit "Uptown Funk." The dance-off sequence between Mars' and Beyonce's dancers was a hair-raising thriller, perhaps equalling the gym sequence between the Jets and Sharks in West Side Story. Here's a replay incase you missed it the first time.

Best Stereotype Buster
Conrad Ricamora as Oliver Hampton in How To Get Away With Murder. Well, he is a computer expert, but that's not the stereotype we're talking about. Ricamora recently won the Visibility Award for his portrayal of a gay character. Oliver is an interesting and multi-dimensional LGBTQ person of color -- a great role for the actor but also great visibility for the Asian/American and LGBTQ communities. “I will say that it’s a little ironic to be getting the Visibility Award because so much of growing up as a kid was spent trying to be invisible,” said Ricamora. “It was rough, not only being gay, but having the colored skin that I have. I was terrified that someone would see me as gay and I was also terrified that I would see myself for what I naturally was.”

Best Farewell Performance
We would be remiss if we didn't mention Steven Yeun's portrayal of Glenn Rhee as played in TV's The Walking Dead. Glenn's brutal demise at the hands of Negan and his baseball bat Lucille, was one of the most shocking and dreadful end to one of television's best Asian/American characters. Through seven seasons, Yeun was able to transform Glenn from the pizza-delivery guy to a heroic zombie killer without ever resorting to anything that hinted at the Asian male stereotype. The character of Glenn was perhaps the best nuanced, AAPI characters television has ever presented.

RELATED:

• The first awards was called the Eddies
• The 2nd awards became the Anna's because the Eddies Awards were already taken

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Rogue One is the most Asian of the Star War episodes

From left, Donnie Yen, Jiang Wen and Rez Ahmed.

ROGUE ONE: A Star Wars Story, the latest incarnation from the Star Wars universe, is the most Asian of all the episodes produced so far.

I'm excited that the Disney production sees fit to include Asians in prominent roles in the universe.

Star Wars takes place in a universe a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, but George Lucas, the Star Wars creator, has drawn heavily from our Earth, specifically Asia: From the Samurai-like appearance of villain Darth Vader, to the style of sword-fighting that (at the time) was new to western audiences more attuned to the fencing style of Europe; to the existence of The Force, what martial artists refer to as the "chi" or "ki," the inner spirit, or force, that can be focused into a powerful punch or mind-over-matter state.

The 1959 Kurosawa samurai classic, The Hidden Fortress, was the inspiration for the original trio of the Star Wars saga, which actually started in episode 4 of the nine-film outline.

“I remember the one thing that really struck me about The Hidden Fortress,” said Lucas, “the one thing I was really intrigued by, was the fact that the story was told from the two lowest characters. I decided that would be a nice way to tell the Star Wars story. Take the two lowliest characters, as Kurosawa did, and tell the story from their point of view. Which, in the Star Wars case is the two droids, and that was the strongest influence."

The influence comes from watching hours upon hours of martial arts films from Hong Kong and Japan that made Lucas such a fan of Japanese legendary director Akira Kurosawa. You can see his influence in Lucas' work that he is best known for from the battle scenes to the wipes from scene to scene.

Even the idea of the Jedi, mystical warriors who have mastered The Force, remind you of the 47 Ronin (the Japanese original, not the remake with Keanu Reeves), who remain loyal to their clan even in the face of overwhelming odds. In the Japanese martial arts, mastering ki (The Force) is the goal of master practitioners.

But back to Rogue One, which is being released Dec. 16 in the the U.S. It takes place before the original trilogy. The heroic core group is a Trump supporter's nightmare. There's not a white male among them. 

The central character Jyn Ersois (British actress Felicity Jones), a badass woman who leads a band of rebels whose mission is steal the plans of the Empire's newest weapon, the Death Star. 

Diego Luna, a Latino actor, plays Cassian Andor of the Rebel Alliance. 

Three Asians make up the rest of the team. THREE! And they are not red shirts, nor are they given a token one or two lines to recite. Their characters are critical to the plot.

Chirrut Imwe (Donnie Yen)
Pronounced chi-RUT, he’s no Jedi, but he’s devoted to their ways and has used his spirituality to overcome his blindness and become a formidable warrior. “Chirrut falls into the category of being a warrior monk,” says Kennedy. “He very much still believes in everything the Jedi were about.” He maintains that belief even though the Jedi are no longer there to protect the galaxy. As director Gareth Edwards puts it: "This idea that magical beings are going to come and save us is going away, and it’s up to normal, everyday people to take a stand to stop evil from dominating the world.”

Baze Malbus (Jiang Wen)
Heavily armored, Baze prefers a blaster to hokey religions and ancient weapons, but he is devoted to protecting his friend Chirrut at all costs. “He understands Chirrut’s spiritual centeredness, but he doesn’t necessarily support it,” say producer Kathleen Kennedy. Baze goes along with this Force business because “it’s what his friend deeply believes,” she adds. Think of them as a little like the galactic version of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza.

Bodhi Rook (Riz Ahmed)
Bodhi is this Rebel squad’s lead pilot. He tends to be hot-headed, but any abrasiveness is overshadowed by his skills in the air — and the void of space. “He flies a lot of cargo, one of his key jobs,” Kennedy says. “And he tends to be a little tense, a little volatile, but everybody in the group really relies on his technical skills.”

The casting is not all altruistic. I'm sure the choice of Asian stars Wen and Yen is a nod to the huge Chinese market that is predicted to become the No. 1 movie-going market, surpassing the United States.

But that shouldn't take anything away from having Asian faces up on the big screen. Somewhere, there's an Asian/American kid out there who will come to the realization that we belong, that we exist, that we matter -- even if it's in a galaxy far, far away.

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