unreality

The movie Thor is coming out soon and there are a few critics who are unhappy with the casting of African-American actor Idris Elba as Heimdall.  Apparently they don't think a black man is the right choice to depict a Marvel comic book character of a Nordic god.  Riiight.





In case you are not a comic reader this is what Heimdall looks like:


Historically accurate I imagine, with no room for artistic interpretation or creative license whatsoever.  Let me add some other depictions of the MYTHICAL Heimdall for reference:


Now here is Elba's Heimdall, a fierce and vengeful god :

Even better, I will include Elba's response to the strict historians:
"It's so ridiculous. We have a man [Thor] who has a flying hammer and wears horns on his head. And yet me being an actor of African descent playing a Norse god is unbelievable? I mean, Cleopatra was played by Elizabeth Taylor, and Gandhi was played by Ben Kingsley." (emphasis mine) (source)

Game, set, match.

Comments

ulaca said…
It makes as much sense as preventing a white actor from portraying Anansi.

Kingsley is half Indian, of course.
architart said…
Krishna Pandit Bhanji or not, he didn't resemble Gandhi but no one remembered that within a few minutes of the opening credits because he was convincing.

And how about Linda Hunt as Billy Kwan?

I don't know about the Anansi issue. What is it about?