‘Gods of Egypt’ Faces ‘Whitewashing’ Controversy, Criticisms Prior to Feb. 2016 Debut; 1st Trailer with Gerard Butler Released

By Staff Writer

Nov 24 2015, 11:04 AM EST

'Gods of Egypt' is an upcoming adventure-fantasy film that follows ancient Egyptian deities. However, Alex Proyas' ambitious new cinematic feat is plagued with "whitewashing" controversy as his principal cast does not feature any actors of Middle Eastern descent. First official trailer starring Gerard Butler is released.

New character posters revealed on /Film showed that the movie's principal cast is composed of Gerard Butler who plays Set - God of the Desert, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau as Horus - God of the Sky, Elodie Young as Hathor - Goddess of Love and Chadwick Boseman as Thoth - God of Wisdom.

Of the main actors named, none seemed to be of Middle Eastern descent. Coster-Waldau is Danish, Butler is Scottish, Young is French-Cambodian while Boseman is an American hailing from South Carolina.

According to Alternet, the film's new trailer was released just recently and erupted in criticism after it showed scene after scene of poor casting choices as well as "cheesy" CGI effects including fire-breathing serpents. It called to mind other "whitewashed" films such as 'Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time' starring Jake Gyllenhaal, 'Exodus: Gods and Kings' starring Christian Bale, 'Aloha' starring Emma Stone and 'The Lone Ranger' starring Johnny Depp.

Another article by the Guardian posted a collection of tweets from users and celebrities alike calling out to the people behind the controversial casting. Even comedienne Bette Midler posted an image showing Caucasian extras. She captioned the photograph, "Movie, #GodsOfEgypt in which everyone is white? Egyptians, in history and today, have NEVER been white. BRING BACK GEOGRAPHY!! It's Africa!"

'Gods of Egypt' is an upcoming adventure-fantasy film directed by Alex Proyas based on a screenplay by Matt Sazama and Burk Sharpless. It is produced under Summit Entertainment and will be released by its parent company Lionsgate on February 26, 2016.

Proyas worked on other popular films including the 1994 cult favorite 'The Crow', 2004's 'I, Robot' and 2009's 'The Knowing'. He is known to employ dark overtones in his films - reminiscent of Stanley Kubrick or Ridley Scott's artistic style.