# Other Cringeworthy Blackface/Yellowface/Etc. movies **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** movies\ **Created:** [June 23, 2026, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135 "2026-06-23T15:04:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 14
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2026, 12:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135/261 "2026-07-27T12:32:41Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > I agree. So when it is used to mock or insult - it’s wrong. But when it is satire, etc, then- mostly Okay then? Some of the examples here are satirizing the idea of blackface It’s a very thin tightrope to walk. Even with the best intentions it runs the danger of being in bad taste and an even greater danger of aging horribly. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2026, 1:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135/262 "2026-07-27T13:04:56Z")
Someone in another thread mentioned a show where Emma Stone was supposed to be a native Hawaiian, in a show that was supposedly celebrating the diversity and native culture of Hawaii. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2026, 1:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135/263 "2026-07-27T13:34:07Z")
Actually that was in this very thread. Cameron Crowe, the writer and director of the movie said the character was based on a real-life red-headed woman with that ethnic background. > [@AlsoNamedBort](#): > > There’s plenty of examples just given in this thread. But here’s a couple more I haven’t seen mentioned. > > Johnny Depp as Tonto > Emma Stone as a part-Chinese, part-Hawaiian woman in Aloha. > Rooney Mara as Tiger Lily in the recent Peter Pan remake > Benedict Cumberbatch playing Khan. which is multiple layers wrong there ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2026, 1:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135/264 "2026-07-27T13:59:56Z")
Technically Scarlet Johansen playing Major Motoko Kusanagi in the Ghost in the Shell film really shouldn’t be problematic. The film was on cable the other day and technically her character is playing an Asian woman’s brain encased in a cybernetic body that is shaped like Scarlet Johansen such that Motoko’s actual mother doesn’t recognize her appearance. It’s not worth really thinking about too hard. IRL designing a cybernetic supersoldier it the shape of a busty 5’2" woman who cuts her own hair without a mirror makes about as much sense as Skynet designing an “infiltration unit” in the form of the most jacked dude you’ve ever seen with a distinctive accent. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2026, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135/265 "2026-07-27T17:53:36Z")
> [@Loach](#): > > It’s a very thin tightrope to walk. Even with the best intentions it runs the danger of being in bad taste and an even greater danger of aging horribly. True. > [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > Cameron Crowe, the writer and director of the movie said the character was based on a real-life red-headed woman with that ethnic background. And the character was supposed to be half Swedish. ---
**Author:** ![Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/q.q.switcheroo/32/5713_2.png) [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.Q.Switcheroo)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2026, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135/266 "2026-07-31T02:28:25Z")
> [@Shoeless](#): > > What about Eddie Murphy in the “White Like Me” short film on SNL? Speaking of SNL, there was the sketch with Mike Myers as a Japanese game show host and Alec Baldwin and Janene Garofalo as Japanese contestants (with the third contestant a clueless White American played by Chris Farley). To their credit, all three non-Farley actors delivered their lines in accurate if poorly pronounced Japanese. More recently, SNL ran a sketch purporting to show the Japanese version of “The Office,” though half the joke seemed to be that the characters were being portrayed by White actors (including guest star Steve Carell). ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2026, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135/267 "2026-07-31T04:08:47Z")
> [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](#): > > More recently, SNL ran a sketch purporting to show the Japanese version of “The Office,” How about John Belushi in his Samurai… skits? ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2026, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135/268 "2026-07-31T04:17:57Z")
> [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](#): > > More recently, SNL ran a sketch purporting to show the Japanese version of “The Office,” though half the joke seemed to be that the characters were being portrayed by White actors (including guest star Steve Carell). “It’s funny because it’s racist.” ---
**Author:** ![Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/q.q.switcheroo/32/5713_2.png) [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.Q.Switcheroo)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2026, 11:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135/269 "2026-07-31T11:45:19Z")
And I’m just now remembering Dave Thomas as Lin Ye Tang on SCTV. ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2026, 1:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135/270 "2026-07-31T13:34:51Z")
Has Alex Borstein’s Ms Swan on Mad TV been mentioned yet. ---
**Author:** ![Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/q.q.switcheroo/32/5713_2.png) [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.Q.Switcheroo)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2026, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135/271 "2026-07-31T15:09:20Z")
The MadTV writers always insisted she was meant to be a generic “funny foreigner” with no particular ethnicity. OTOH, in her first appearance, she was named “Ms. Kwan”… ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2026, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135/272 "2026-07-31T16:07:49Z")
> [@F.U.Shakespeare](#): > > Joseph Wiseman as _Dr. No._ IIRC, No was of mixed Asian/Caucasian (British?) ancestry, so not really a bad choice for the role. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_Q](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/898d66/32.png) [@Johnny\_Q](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Q)\ **Post date:** [August 2, 2026, 10:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135/273 "2026-08-02T10:14:39Z")
Dana Carvey as Ching Change. “Chicken make lousy housepet.” ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2026, 1:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135/274 "2026-08-11T01:26:35Z")
The cover of David Lee Roth’s album “Eat 'Em and Smile” is pretty cringe. The native character also made appearances in his videos. I don’t know if it’s better or worse that the origin of the character was a bit ambiguous. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [August 11, 2026, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135/275 "2026-08-11T21:10:39Z")
> [@Loach](#): > > The native character also made appearances in his videos. I mostly remember that character in the “convenience store” lead-in for the video to “Yankee Rose,” which was 90 seconds of racist, sexist, and body-shaming “humor.” I am ashamed now, that 40 years ago, young stupid me found it hilarious. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2026, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135/276 "2026-08-12T01:09:39Z")
It’s still a catchy tune. He had a much better band than he deserved. [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/65o3MFsb0BY/maxresdefault.jpg "David Lee Roth - Yankee Rose (Official Video) [HD]") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65o3MFsb0BY) ---
**Author:** ![Baker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bb73d2/32.png) [@Baker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baker)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2026, 1:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135/277 "2026-08-12T01:16:43Z")
In a favorite silent film of mine, it’s still odd to see Richard Bartemeiss playing a Chinese merchant. This was _Broken Blossoms_, one of the saddest films I ever saw ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2026, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135/278 "2026-08-12T12:29:29Z")
In the 1925 version of **The Lost World** , white actor Jules Cowles plays the Least Convincing White Actor in Blackface ever. His character is named “Zambo”. Although the Wikipedia article claims that he’s a native (South American) servant, the dialogue he’s given in the intertitles is pretty clearly supposed to be “black” accented (although some modern versions use more generic dialogue). It’s pretty clearly a white guy with swarthy makeup slathered onto him. He’s not very convincing as a South American native, either, though. [https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0184801/mediaviewer/rm3129358336/?ref\_=nm\_ph\_1\_1](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0184801/mediaviewer/rm3129358336/?ref_=nm_ph_1_1) Weird thing – in some scenes his arm is in a sling, as if he sprained or broke it, but it’s never explained how this happened. The movie is considered over 95% complete these days, after the film archives o the world were scoured for the missing scenes, but I haven’t seen anything to explain this. Or some other scenes in the film – like the one where Professor Challenger seems to think he’s lost his hat. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2026, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135/279 "2026-09-07T13:36:37Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > Somehow, it seems more insulting, from this old white guy’s perspective, to cast them as the wrong ethnicity than say, the same of Michael Ansara. It smacks of “all Asians look alike.” I don’t know. Michael Ansara was Syrian-American, and he got cast in all sorts of Native American roles. How hard would it have been to find anyone closer to Native American than someone of Syrian descent? I suspect they didn’t even try. I think you can spin it around and say at least they cast Asian actors, instead of some sort of yellowface type thing with Asian-ish looking actors playing those roles, even if they didn’t go to the trouble to find actual Japanese/Hawaiian actors on Magnum PI/Hawaii 5-0 and just cast James Hong or whoever. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2026, 1:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135/280 "2026-09-07T13:46:12Z")
> [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > Actually that was in this very thread. Cameron Crowe, the writer and director of the movie said the character was based on a real-life red-headed woman with that ethnic background. I can believe it; I knew a girl in college who was of 100% Mexican descent, and she had auburn hair, pale skin, and green eyes. Weird roll of the genetic dice, I suppose. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135.md?page=13) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/other-cringeworthy-blackface-yellowface-etc-movies/1031135.md?page=15)