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SALT LAKE CITY - "The Hunger Games" has broken box office records and wowed critics, boasting a healthy 85-percent on Rotten Tomatoes. Despite making boat loads of money and satisfying audiences, a small group of fans are upset with the movie for one very specific, and quite racist reason. They are upset some of the characters were cast with black actors.
After the movie debuted Twitter exploded with fans upset with the casting choices.
"Why does Rue have to be black not gonna lie kinda ruined the movie," tweeted one fan.
"Why is Rue a little black girl? Stick to the book, dude," tweeted another fan.
These are just two examples of hundreds of tweets about the casting choices. Some people were also upset to see Lenny Kravitz as Katniss' stylist, Cinna.
These complaints are interesting for two reasons, one that people are so ready and willing to be offensive on a worldwide social network, and two, that they clearly did not read the book very closely. Author Suzanne Collins made it pretty clear that both tributes from District 11 were not white. This is an excerpt from page 45 of "The Hunger Games:
Collins then, later in the book, describes Thresh:
"The boy tribute from District 11, Thresh, has the same dark skin as Rue, but the resemblance stops there. He's one of the giants, probably six and half feet tall and built like an ox."
As I read the book I imagined both of these characters as black the entire time, and why did I? Because the author told me they were. I am no diehard fan of the book, but unlike many other "diehards" I actually paid attention to the words on the page.
The book makes no reference to the color of Cinna's skin, which means some readers probably imagined him as a black man, others a white man. Others, still, probably Asian, Indian, Arabic, gay, straight, fat, thin, dog-lover, cat-lover or just about anything else.
What it all means is it doesn't matter what he really looked like. What we should really be focusing on is that all of the actors cast to play these parts did a phenomenal job.
Thankfully a large number of people made sure to come out and support the casting choices. This is my personal favorite:
"Head's up: if discovering Rue is black 'ruins' the Hunger Games movie for you, you have a lot bigger issues to worry about than casting," tweeted @DebraDriza.
If Dayo Okeniyi who played Thresh, Amandla Stenberg who played Rue or Lenny Kravitz had done a poor job in their parts I would understand people being upset about the casting choices because of their acting ability. But to be upset with three actors, who nailed their parts, just because they were black is ludicrous. Just as ludicrous if people were upset that Katniss was white, or that Haymitch was played by a vegan or that President Snow was depicted by an atheist.
Tell us your opinion of the casting choices from the film on our comment boards and on our Facebook page and give us your opinion of those upset about the skin color of some of those choices.
