The beginning of his downfall was "The Village" despite its decent box office. Word of mouth for that movie set the stage for Lady and Happening.

I'm torn about whether a project like this is the way for him to start coming back, since it is very, very, VERY, hard to imagine this movie making much money at all, but because of that, expectations will be very low. Time will tell.

Just saw the Teaser on Youtube, looks EPIC. I just hope it has the same mix of action, drama and comedy that made me a fan of the animated series. Personally I liked "The Happening" and look forward to the post Airbender movies M. Night's cooking up.

I believe that The Village stands shoulder to shoulder with Sixth Sense and Unbreakable. I didn't like the Happening, but I blame that on the uncharacteristically wooden performances by Wahlberg and Deschanel (sp?). I'm surprised by his decision to take another creators property to film, but I don't need to see and Oscar contender every time M. dares take on a new project. I've spent $ on worse.

I'm asian-slash-pacific islander and IMHO, can truly say the "outrage" of a "non-asian" actor playing the lead is asinine, stupid and downright insulting . Who cares if he's non-asian? Just because it's in "anime" style, involves kung-fu and is set in "mystic worlds" does it mean it HAS to be an asian lead? It's almost like this backward racist entitlement that those who are angry are saying. I've watched the show with my son and Ang seemed to me a world citizen, not particularly asian. So to my fellow asians who gets a wedgie about a non-asian playing the lead, jeez louise, calm down. Yes our lot gets picked on, looked over and under-rep. But pick fights where it counts not one that makes us look like whining spoiled little brats.

People what are you smoking this movie is going to blow big time the only thing good is going tobe de CGI effects nothing more , the story is the same as the TV series is the casting that is bad example lets make a viking movie and cast afroamerican or african actors what is hapening in this movie is whitewhashing
and tony no offense but man !!!!!! ! be more proud of your ascentry
I will say : Im no white and niether asian but I feel is insane to make a movie an asian fantasy world and cast white actors as the leads

Tony, the way I see it you're the one who sounds whinny. You make it sound like this is the only movie to come out in the last century that miscasts obviously non-white characters. It's not. It happens all the time. And if you think that's not important you're blind. The only exposure most people ever really have to people of other cultures and "races" is through movies and TV. Like it or not, our view of each other mostly painted by the brush of those media. And that view can have a profound effect on how people see themselves and others, especially young people. If people continually see Asians, Blacks, Hispanics, and others as background in video then that's all they'll expect them to be. If you don't believe me ask a psychologist. Wouldn't it be nice if your kids could see a heroic Asian lead? Wouldn't it be great to see someone who isn't white save the world for a change? Is that too much to ask?
Oh, and fans aren't just upset by the fact that one character isn't the same from the same group as he is in the show. They are upset because almost none of them are. And because the only person who isn't is the villain.

This movie has all the right set ups to be epic and amazing but I really can't stand behind it with the whitewashed cast.

Avatar is one of the best children series that's come out of the US in a while and that it's made by a diverse group of Americans makes me very very proud. And then to have it become a movie where all the animated effects are about to get a one up... AMAZING! So why is it that we can't have a diverse cast for this movie?

You're already using relatively unknown and newbie actors, why not give an asian actor a chance? The set and styles of fighting as so distinctively Asian (and a wide variety of Asian ethnicities are presented as well), why not?

The argument with the whitewashing of 21 is that the public won't relate to an mostly Asian cast, but you can't make the same excuse for Avatar since the TV series have gained so much popularity with it's obviously Asian cast and setting.

I love Dev Patel and I'm sure he's up to being Zuko on a talent skill, but as the show progresses and you meet Zuko's family, they are all so very obviously Asian, down to the ceremonial grab and the old people's love of tea. Dev (and the other actors) can pull off this first movie, but what if there's a second one? Who will be Azula? Mai? Ty Lee? Ozai?

Lastly, I think what's also important is the message that's being sent. Are white people really that much better at acting? People have gotten behind Asian leads in other movies before, why does Hollywood refuse to acknowledge that it's even possible? There are many good arguments (some that I support) for why the cast chosen work for this movie, but what I want to ask, is why not? Why not Asian actors? All the story elements make sense to cast Asians, so why not? Why not promote diversity? Why not empower? Why not?

They're still letting this idiot make movies? And why is anyone paying attention? Have you never heard of a one-hit wonder?

M. Night makes very intelligent and original movies. Those who do not like them are those who cannot wrap their minds around anything other than cookie cutter Hollywood plots. Heaven help if we actually have to think when watching a movie!! I watched this show with my son and we both enjoyed it as it was intelligent and well rounded plot. I think M. Night is a good choice for the movie and look forward to seeing it with my son. As to the casting they looked for "talented" actors who also have martial arts skills and cast it as they found it. if you look at Aang in the show he is very non-descript so there should be no issue there. The challenge in casting is finding actors that come close to the characters but also have a universal appeal. I think he has done well with his choices. Bottom line is if you do not like what he is doing just don't go see it. And for the love of god lighten up as it IS only a movie... one that I will enjoy seeing.

Sixth Sense
Unbreakable
Signs

HARDLY a one-hit wonder. Night's movies are always going to be hit or miss because it's obvious that he is not filming them based on opinion polls, much like a certain filmmaker (George Lucas) he writes and directs the stories the way he sees fit. When the audience buys into the premise, the payoff will be huge (see all three movies above). When they don't, the movie will bomb (The Village, Lady in the Water, The Happening). Lady in the Water wasn't bad(I've seen far, far worse), but it was certainly odd. Haven't seen The Happening yet so I won't judge it. The Village had potential but it was just way too obvious what was going on.

I believe the flaw in most of M. Night's recent films is how he tried so hard to build up to that big "twist" in the end. That whole build up that worked for the Sixth Sense is just so hard to reproduce.

I'm just glad I saw this teaser because I'm finally happy that at the very least i'm pretty sure this adaptation will not suck as I originally thought (like most of you)

I still don't understand the choice Shyamalan. I just think they could have found another director that would have been a better fit.

Also I know it's all about the money...but I would have preferred them to make more of the show rather than the movie...and I definately don't like the look of the cast...

If you're a genre fan and you didn't pitch a fit at Michale Clarke Duncan being cast as the Kingpin, you should probably shut up about the casting for this film for non-hypocrisy's sake.

And if you did throw a fit over the Daredevil movie casting, you should probably be locked in a small cell with Trekkies upset over a devil figure appearing in an ep of STTNG despite an earlier proclamation that the Klingons had no devil...

Eh. I'm not looking forward to this, because there's no way a live action movie could ever compete against the original animated shows.

i am a big fan of the show, and i am also a big fan of the movie already. the casting looks perfect. and about the whole arguement about not having asian casting, i think that if dante dimartino and brian konitzko didn't like the casting they would have done something about it, but they didn't which means they like it. and that means i like it. i think dev patel is also a perfect casting. have you seen the pictures. he looks the part
and i know he can act. i saw slumdog millionare. amazing
another thing, m night shyamalan is a big fan of the show. his whole family is. he is the best choice for director because he isn't gonna want to mess up anything about it. there is no other director out there that i can think of who loves this show more.

@Aaronswing - The entire cast and crew of the animated series had to sign a non-disclosure agreement, which basically prevents them from saying anything AGAINST the film. However, the non-disclosure doesn't not prevent them from saying anything POSITIVE about the film. So their silence, actually, suggests that they are not fans of the film.

As for M. Night being a fan of the series -- he's not. He didn't even know about the series until his daughter asked to dress up as Katara for Halloween. He saw some pictures, maybe a couple of episodes, then decided to make his own interpretation of the material, without actually considering the source.

This movie's going to tank, and those poor child actors (maybe save for Dev Patel, who's established through Slumgdog) are never going to recover from this.

er doesn't prevent them from saying anything POSITIVE*

The movie actually looks like it has real potential. Shame about the cast. I'm really tired of watching white actors pretend they're Asian onscreen. I watched Broken Blossoms and Breakfast at Tiffany's for class and everyone acknowledges that what those films did vis a vis their Asian characters was racist. But when it shows up in the modern day, people are bending over backwards to say that the characters aren't even Asian and that they picked the best actors for the part. It's the same problem, the same excuses, the same turning of the blind eye on Hollywood discrimination.

I suggest people check out racebending.com to fully understand the issues. Otherwise, I was really excited to see a live-action of my favorite cartoon, but I can't watch them shred some of the best things about the show (the humor! the authentic martial arts! the largely Asian fantasy world!). Skipping this movie.

My friends and I who are fans of Avatar: The Last Airbender will not be seeing this movie or any of its sequels because of the whitewashing of the Water Nation which is undeniably NOT white at all. Also, there is inappropriate representation of casting ethnic minorities as characters from the Earth Nation and Fire Nation, the nations who have the more morally ambiguous and corrupt characters compared to the other two.

I don't understand why the people in charge of this movie thought casting various racial groups would "diversify" the movie. If they paid any attention to the cultures, clothing, and architecture of each nation, they'd be aware of the following:

Water Nation = Inuit
Earth Nation = China, Japan, and Korea
Fire Nation = China
Air Nation = Tibet

As that shows, Asia is a very diverse continent that has many cultures that are very different. Sadly, Hollywood is continuing the assumption that all Asians look the same and the public doesn't want to watch them be the focus of films and television because they can't relate to them. Institutional racism will continue and one of the biggest reasons why is because the media. And The Last Airbender continues this very sad cycle.

There is plenty of obvious racial diversity in each of the four nations within the animated series. That was likely intentional to illustrate that the four nations aren't divided by race, as it is in our world, but only by the element they represent. Sokka and Katara's skin color has nothing to do with the Fire Nation oppressing them, so it bears no importance to their characters. Sozin didn't exterminate the Air Nomads because of their facial features, so it doesn't matter what ethnicity they might be. As long as Noah can do Ba Gua, he can play an airbender as well as anyone else.

The Avatar interpretation of discrimination is an !analogy! to ours. And it makes the complaints about the cast embarrassing because it misses the point, and actually plays into the racial preconceptions we carry. Do you want it to NOT be accurate to the series, just to fit your preconceived notion that only Asian people can do kung fu and build pagodas?

Like it was taught in the show: We are all connected. All one people. That which we believe separates us is just an illusion.

@Hanibi Um, nobody said that only Asian people can do kung fu and build pagodas. Protestors are arguing for accuracy's sake: it's fact that Sokka and Katara have brown skin, why did they change it? What's wrong with having brown skin? Why did the producers put "Caucasian or any other ethnicity" on the casting sides for the characters Aang, Sokka, Katara, and Zuko? If they didn't really care about race, the would've just put "Any ethnicity" on the casting sides.

This movie doesn't show that we're all connected and one people. This movie is showing that only white people can be heroes who save the background Asian and African people from the South Asian looking genocidal terrorists.

Please learn more about the issues at racebending.com

PS. His Bagua is awkward, just check out "Bagua" in youtube for comparsion. That's not the Bagua of a supposed master.

I read these comments, because I am just interested in what people think about the article. Then I find this trash talk, both sides screaming at each other over the issue of skin.

I live in a multi race society, and every time I go to town I see people of different races, if not cultures. I don't movies to tell me what to think about people, I learnt from from my culture and society.

Some of the best actors have played roles where they are acting as a member of another race. And in this film Aang isn't an asian. So what? In the cartoon series he wasn't from Japan or China, he was an air nomand, fom the Southern Air Temple. It was a cartoon, it was not clear what racial features he had that might compare to features of our world. He was wearing asian styled clothes, but so does characters in Firefly, and you didn't see Joss Whendon fans tearing their hair out, demanding that Inara and Kaylee were recast for the movie.

The filming is almost over, things can't be changed now. Move on, except it and before you decide it is going to be a flop or not, I dare you to watch that teaser trailer and go to the cinema July 2010 and see the movie. If you decide to hate a film you haven't even seen a trailer of because it had white actors, then I that you are the people who are racist. Then you are stupid bigots.

@JediClaire: Whether the movie is good or not is not the point. This is capitalist America and we vote with our wallets whether or not we want this travesty to stand or succeed. We aren't bashing the actors' skills, but the fact that the filmmakers could have taken the very simple action of casting actors of the correct races and decided not to. There are difficulties in all adaptations, but to me, that seems like a pretty basic issue. It may be a fantasy world, but the creators did a lot of research to base it on actual, East Asian cultures from our world. Dressing a white person as a character so obviously Asian is about as bad as putting Ben Stiller as the lead in a Bernie Mac biopic. You can't act like another race, and trying to do so in a world so clearly made entirely of Asian influences is insulting to the hundreds of Asian American actors that they could have given a chance. "Diversity" is being used in this case to cover up the fact that the heroes are white in an obviously Asian world. This perpetuates a huge tradition of "yellowface" in Western filming; it's bigger than just this movie, and things like this shape peoples' perceptions of Asians and Asian actors. With this movie, they had the opportunity to break out of that cycle, and they chose not to. Every attempt to be accurate now is a brutal slap in the face of a series that had a lot of careful, loving research go into it. I will be boycotting this film and getting as many people as possible to do the same.

For more information: racebending.com. They have a lot of information on the subject.

Casting calls:
Aang: "Caucasian or any other ethnicity"
Katara: "Caucasian or any other ethnicity"
Sokka: "Caucasian or any other ethnicity"

Whatever happened to "Any ethnicity"? Now you tell me that singling out a race like that isn't racism. I've nothing against the actors, but I've something against THIS. So, YES, the people making this movie are doing it with much racism.

@Hanibi I ve a few points that I want to clear first before posting another coment that I made sometime ago

1-- Nobody is saying that the avatar Universe is asian universe but you dont think is look like that , if quack like a duck ,walk like a duck dont you think that maybe it is a duck

2- Avatar is in alternet medieval dimension white people dont exist there ,if you are saying that aang look white maybe you have to see an asia play most of hte characters paint theirs faces white , the geishas paint the face white when they are entertainning

3- the differents nations are no asian percet but man!!!!!!!!!! they look asian
here it is my old post

By FantasyFan at 1:25 PM ON 01/20/09

I’m not a hardcore fan of avatar but I watched from time to time and like it, in order to tell a story base of a comic book, TV show, book Etc. You have to be the most close to the original material as you can get, if not the story lose its appeal
Watch closely and you see that in avatar the different countries are base in the next cultures
The 4 Mains Factions:
Airs Nomads: Tibetan & Shaolin monks
Water Tribes: Inuit
Earth Kingdom: Korean
Fire Nation: Japanese & Chínese
Also:
Kioshi Island : Japanese
The spirit Library: is a pyramid
If you watch You see there is not any influence of Anglo-Saxon culture in avatar, but You can say that the characters are white because you see them with light skin , there are asian people with light skin, but everything is happening in an Asian world, there are no White people and they can be White as snow everyone even aang but they still are Asian
And those who justify this kind of casting saying that there aren’t talented Asia actors you are wrong they are but most of the Hollywood cinema only sees not Anglo-American actors as villains, minions or sidekicks. And let’s make example let’s put Denzel Washington (In my opinion one of the best actors of this generation) as a Samurai in feudal Japan. Also let’s do World War II movie and the Japanese part will be play by African American, Latin or better yet Anglo Saxon actors just because there are not talented Asia actors it’s just plain stupid . if you still don’t believe it listen to this in 1956 Jonh Wayne stars in the film The Conqueror base on the life of mongol leader genghis khan , and what about Will Smith in Wild Wild West
And those who say that the voice actor are white, that just saying stupid things, you are a voice actor that is lending your voices to a characters that doesn’t have anything in common with you, for example if you remember (anime Film )Ninja Scroll from director Yoshiaki Kawajiri the main character is Japanese, the voice in the dubbed version is a white actor , also black and white characters in Japanese anime are voices by Japanese seiyu (seiyu is the equivalent of voice actor in japan), but with a live action film the rules of the game change completely .
To quote Fez (from that’s 70 show )So you are telling that in country with a population over 200 millions habitants there are not talented Asian actors, boy I don’t believe you
Frankly I like the series it was good and have a regular ending, the creators did their homework very well whoever see this series won’t believe is a North American TV show but it is, but I don’t see the need to make a movie the way I see it, is just to continue make money from this franchise

But here is the kicker if you don’t like it just don’t buy a ticket to see it tell your friends to no see it, don’t buy the merchandise, I know I wont
I apologized if I offended anybody with my opinion but is the truth and sometimes the truth hurt, another thing forgive my English if there are mistake, English is no my first language

FantasyFan wrote:
"1-- Nobody is saying that the avatar Universe is asian universe but you dont think is look like that , if quack like a duck ,walk like a duck dont you think that maybe it is a duck"

Not necessarily. In their world it's more than likely a turtleduck. A hybrid species that doesn't exist in our world. Is that offensive toward ducks or something? Why is it so horrible to suggest that the people in Avatar represent a mix of real world influences as well? The fact that the people of each nation carry a variety of colors and traits supports this.

"2- Avatar is in alternet medieval dimension white people dont exist there"

Hello? Swamp-dwelling waterbenders? Their music and accents were definitely inspired by white rednecks in the deep south of the U.S. And they were descendants of the Water Tribes who moved there from the poles. So what race are they?

It doesn't mean they MUST be Caucasian or Inuit or Asian. They can hire a racially diverse mix of actors to portray them as well, and it wouldn't be an insult to any culture, as far as I'm concerned. As long as they live in a swamp, wear leaves as clothes, and bend water. That's what defines them.

"3- the differents nations are no asian percet but man!!!!!!!!!! they look asian"

That was your first point, wasn't it?

You can draw on all the similarities you like, but culture and race are two different things. A white person is perfectly capable of being born and raised in Japan, learn their language, eat their food, wear their clothes, and master their martial arts. Even if they're not Asian, they can be perfectly functioning and fully respected members of that society, as long as they're not held back by prejudices.

Putting Samuel Jackson in medieval Japan would seem strange, because that's OUR world. But Piandao, based on Sifu Kisu, a black man in the Fire Nation isn't seen as strange by anyone, because the Fire Nation is NOT our world. It's a fictional world, and it's a creative and original world however Mike and Bryan want it to be.

@Hanibi you are correct in yours assertion avatar is not 100% asian but lets make a estimate about 80 % is based in asian culture and mithology, the name avatar come from india , the clothes in Kioshi island are defenily japanese , the caligrafy is chinese, some biuldings look asian , bu I must give you that inuit are not asian and another thing the creators had said that the tv series is based in asian culture , no I , is not completely but parcialy also before I forget if you see katara and sokka they defenily look native american not white

WOW.... considering all the mispellings and grammatical errors in these posts I can assume the intelligence level of the people who wrote them. Repeat the "fictional world" aspect of the film!!! There is NO white, asian, black, indian etc.... It is a fictional world made up of fictional characters. They cast it based on acting and martial arts skill levels to get a good movie. Just get over the racist BS, suspend your own insecurities and predjudices and just enjoy the movie....

Tony said it best. And you crybabies sound like the racist idiots you are by calling this white-washing. This isn't 1950. I know bashing white people, calling them nazi's and blaming them for everything wrong in the world is in fashion, but it's still wrong.

This story was written by white boys who paid homage to Asian culture. The characters in the story, like most animation coming from that side of the globe, depicts people who appear to be of mixed ethnic backgrounds. Quite often they have very Caucasian features, like Aang for instance. He has pale skin and round eyes. Katara and Sokki, although clearly Inuit, have blue eyes. The makers of the original series obviously didn't feel the need to make every character look like the typical Asian, so why on earth do all you jackasses feel the need to?? Speaking of earth, the story takes place in a mythical world. Not China, Japan, Korea, Thailand, etc...

The worst part about all this whining and protesting is the fact that Noah Ringer, a first time actor, who obviously loves Asian culture and worked very hard to EARN his position as the lead character is having all his hard work undermined by a bunch of prejudiced, racist, backward moving dipshits. I hope he isn't letting this nonsense get him down, but it must be hard to know that in this day and age there are so many people in the world looking for any chance they can get to blame white people for everything.

Grow up you shallow assholes.