orejon4
Well-Known Member
Well, he's never played a Samoan warrior either, so... Most of his modern roles have him cast as a black man who is the product of an interracial relationship - pretty true to type, i.e. his remake of Walking Tall.
Ryan Nece and Willa Ford
- Thread starter Ray9968
- Start date
Well, he's never played a Samoan warrior either, so... Most of his modern roles have him cast as a black man who is the product of an interracial relationship - pretty true to type, i.e. his remake of Walking Tall.
The Dark King
Well-Known Member
What Rock movies have you been watching?
SilverSmith
Well-Known Member
orejon4
Well-Known Member
The aforementioned Walking Tall. His character has a black father and a white mother, as plain as day, even though he has no white ancestry in real life. But it still explicitly tries to locate him within that racial frame. In all fairness, many of his characters exist in fictional universes, so you can't apply a modern frame of analysis. Scorpion King? His character is based on an apocryphal ethnic group from the East Africa/Middle East that no longer exists today, and all of his relatives shown in the film are Pacific Islander actors like him and are dead within five minutes. Hobbs in the Fast/Furious? Given the name and the hue, I would assume is supposed to be a black-ish character, but they don't exactly talk about family in that series, or anything else for that matter, beyond butt-kicking, hot women and race cars.
From what I had read about Dwayne Johnson, he is American and had played in the Canadian Football League for a while before getting into professional wrestling.
After films like The Mummy Returns and The Scorpion King, his star began to shine bright. It was once said that he was going to start in a film about Hawaii's King Kamehameha. I don't know if the film was made or not.
Like Vin Diesel, he enjoyed success in roles that were for white men.
Vin Diesel downplayed his identity and focused on the work as an actor because he probably felt that it wasn't important. I had first seen Diesel in Saving Private Ryan. I would never have thought that he was biracial.
After films like The Mummy Returns and The Scorpion King, his star began to shine bright. It was once said that he was going to start in a film about Hawaii's King Kamehameha. I don't know if the film was made or not.
Like Vin Diesel, he enjoyed success in roles that were for white men.
Vin Diesel downplayed his identity and focused on the work as an actor because he probably felt that it wasn't important. I had first seen Diesel in Saving Private Ryan. I would never have thought that he was biracial.
Shulz021
Well-Known Member
He's pretty much racially ambiguous
For a time, Hollywood liked that type of actor or actress who can fill many roles.
orejon4
Well-Known Member
The Rock's father is an Afro-Canadian former pro wrestler (Rocky Johnson) and his mother is a Samoan chief and pro wrestler's daughter (Ate Maivia). I think that the King Kamehameha biopic is still in the works. It's supposed to be his pet project. As far back as I can remember in the Rock's choice of roles, he is either openly black or implied to be black, such as his Hobbs character in the F/F series. Remember his early comedy role as the black gay aspiring country singer in Get Shorty or Be Cool (I forget which)?
As far as Vin Diesel is concerned, I agree that he downplays race as an ingredient to his character. In fact, I don't recall Vin Diesel ever playing an obviously black character. In fact, his first movie role was a quasi-documentary called Multi-Facial, where he documented his attempts to get roles as a biracial/ambiguous actor and he has since gone on to exploit that, even playing Italian characters (he's half Italian) in several films, not just Saving Private Ryan.
I guess to me the difference is The Rock chooses a variety of roles where he is either black, part black, some other nonwhite ethnicity or unstated, and Vin Diesel is usually Italian or ambiguous, but never black.
This makes me wonder what would have happened if Johnson played The Falcon in the Captain America films and Diesel played Roadblock in G.I. JOE:Retaliation. Honestly, Johnson would have done very well as The Falcon as he had done in G.I. JOE:Retaliation.
Diesel's baby was Riddick and XXX.
This feud between Diesel and Johnson, is it true, or just some hard fluff the media dreamed up?
orejon4
Well-Known Member
Your guess is as good as mine. I read somewhere that it had something to do with Vin Diesel saying the Rock was on steroids. Vin Diesel's stuff is okay, but I vastly prefer the Rock's work to Diesel's
I loved Diesel in Pitch Black. He was cool and deadly as Riddick. I didn't watch the other films.
The steroids allegation. It will never die. Diesel is fat in comparison to Johnson.
orejon4
Well-Known Member
ROFL - just shows how huge The Rock is now.
I liked the Riddick films and most of the Fast series, even though they were mindless fun. Babylon A.D. was okay as well. I think I like the Rock better because he has more range, having done comedy, dark comedy and some grimmer material.
Johnson is way too big to play Falcon lol
orejon4
Well-Known Member
Are you saying a bird that heavy couldn't fly? lol
And how much work Diesel is getting compared to Johnson.
But wait, Diesel has his own production company, correct? A lot of actors have their own production companies to make their own movies. Even Toby McGuire has a production company after making a fortune with Spider-Man and other films.
Could you just imagine those metal wings trying to lift him if the ground? :smt043
Johnson isn't too heavy to play Falcon. He'd be a lot bigger than Chris Evans. But Anthony Mackie had a little more flexibility than Johnson, but I may be wrong.
MilkandCoffee
Well-Known Member
It's not just the size, Johnson's personality would dominate Evans's on screen. Can't let the sidekick out show the hero.
Personality goes a long way.