mizChartreuse!

The United States Poster, "featuring" "all" the "main" characters

...and the United Kingdom poster.

Is something wrong with these photos?

I take umbrage with a couple things.

1. They remade the poster for the UK, deliberately EXCLUDING the black couple in the movie. Why? “A Universal spokesman said the revised advert aimed ‘to simplify the poster to actors who are most recognisable in international markets’.”

2. In the initial poster, the black couple is in the background, so far behind everyone else, that they “look like they’re staying at a different resort,” as one commenter joked in the comments section of the Huffington Post.

People have argued in favor of the BS Universal explanation that Faizon Love and Kali Hawk aren’t well-known actors, but really? While I freely admit I had never heard of either actor before, I still think their pin-sized appearance on the first poster is kind of ridiculous. Perhaps they weren’t the main couple in the film, whereas Vince Vaughn and Malin Akerman are (and who the hell is she?!).

However, in the film Faizon Love and Kali Hawk’s roles are quite integral in the story’s development. The two join the other white couples on the trip, even though they’re just casually dating and Faizon’s character had been recently divorced. For most of the film, the black couple are caricatures of a dysfunctional relationship and in the end, Faizon finds his ex-wife at a nearby resort and realizes he truly loves her. The other couples have equally hilarious relationship problems, so the fact that the black couple’s poster appearance renders them virtually unrecognizable bothers me.

With that, bring on the Racism Bingo Card! Many of these squares also function as excuses/explanations one can use in trying to sugarcoat/justify/deny blatant racism in the year flippin 2009!

What do you think of the poster? Did you see the movie? I enjoyed it, marginally.