Burt Lancaster was not an Indian, but the English/Irish actor played a Potawatomi in Max Steiner's "Jim Thorpe: All-American" and one of Geronimo's tribesman in Robert Aldrich's "Apache". Paul Muni had no Chinese blood. Susan Kohner had no black blood. Marlon Brando had no Okinawan blood. In retrospect, now that the cinema is well-represented by all walks of life, such racial performances, however well-meaning, instantly dates the film. Blood is important, but it doesn't necessarily have to make or break the movie if the filmmaker employs red-face(or black-face, or yellow-face) simply as a means to an end(the productions of "The Good Earth", "Imitation of Life", and "The Teahouse of the August Moon" would not have been mad without the prevailing film industry's political incorrect casting practices), in which the masquerading actors aren't consciously foregrounding their appropriated ethnic impersonation through grotesque minstrelism(for starters, Mickey Rooney's take on the Japanese in Blake Edwards' "Breakfast at Tiffany's"). Nowadays, if a minority race gets misrepresented, it's less a matter of outright racism, but rather, a marketability concern, which is best exemplified by the casting of non-Japanese actresses Zhang Ziyi, Gong Li, and Michelle Yeoh in "Memoirs of a Geisha". Likewise, "Princess Kaiulani", a sugar-coated chronicling of the Hawaiian royal who, due to American intervention, was denied the chance to rule her island nation, would never have been financed with a "Hapa"(a Hawaiian with Caucasian blood). It's a knee-jerk reaction to call this film racist, because the overriding flaw of "Princess Kaiulani" has nothing to do with Q'orianka Kilcher's Peruvian/Spanish background; it's the performance that the filmmaker coaxes out of her, which doesn't clearly delineate a resolute anti-colonization stance. That's because the star of Terrence Malick's "The New World", as Kaiulani, behaves more like her oppressors, than the native Hawaiians she professes to love.
By all accounts, Princess Kaiulani was not a coward, so the historical inaccuracy of a colonialist-led insurgency(during a lighting ceremony which introduced electricity to Honolulu) as being the catalyst for her overseas voyage to England, could be construed as an insult to the girl's legacy. Being non-Hawaiian is not the insult. But it's a forgivable offense(in the context of narrative film), since all biopics that depict the past rewrites itself for the sake of clarity and time compression. While in London, Kaiulani complies with Belle Epoque fashion(wide-shouldered blouse with muttonchop sleeves, cinched with a corset and wide belt to hug the waist), which wouldn't have been especially foreign to the princess, who wore European-style clothing back home, but Kilcher's assignation of the fairer "ali'i" suggests that the filmmaker decided against addressing the young woman's "other-ness". Although Kaiulani should look English, she shouldn't literally be a descendant of Queen Victoria, which is how Kilcher plays the princess, as a "barbarian" without the slightest trepidation about gaining entree into a wholly new culture. Kaiulani seems bereft of royal carriage, giggling and mugging for Clive(Shaun Evans), lost as she is in the throes of love, despite her consciousness(that's why the opening scene proves to be problematic) of the governmental tumult back home, having been a first-hand witness to the king's premier being taken hostage at gunpoint by the Hawaiian League before her hasty departure. This big romance dominates "Princess Kaiulani", at the expense of detail surrounding the fallout from the Bayonet Constitution that resulted in the reigning queen(Liliokulani) being ousted from her dismantled court. The film conjures up emotional uplift(big rabble-rousing speeches, an appointment with President Cleveland, the restoration of her title, purely symbolic) to obscure the tragedy that befell the native population, who had lost their land to the missionaries(a fact that gets lost in Kaiulani's small victory of restoring the Hawaiian people's right to vote), and lives(due to disease transmitted from the newly minted foreign landowners). Not enough is made ado about this drastic transference of power. Worst of all, despite Clive being in cahoots with his family to deceive Kaiulani(who should have known that a coup was in the making), she accepts the British gentleman with open arms at her seaside "coronation", going so far as kissing him in front of her people during their darkest hours. That is not how a dethroned monarch would act. "Princess Kaiulani" treats the loss of her personal happiness and kingdom as commiserating catastrophes.
Being ethnic for an ethnic role, in this case, Hawaiian, is not nearly as important as acting certifiably ethnic, a non-Hawaiian with an authentic spirit, which is what Kilcher lacks, as a result of he filmmaker's passive attitude towards colonization.
By all accounts, Princess Kaiulani was not a coward, so the historical inaccuracy of a colonialist-led insurgency(during a lighting ceremony which introduced electricity to Honolulu) as being the catalyst for her overseas voyage to England, could be construed as an insult to the girl's legacy. Being non-Hawaiian is not the insult. But it's a forgivable offense(in the context of narrative film), since all biopics that depict the past rewrites itself for the sake of clarity and time compression. While in London, Kaiulani complies with Belle Epoque fashion(wide-shouldered blouse with muttonchop sleeves, cinched with a corset and wide belt to hug the waist), which wouldn't have been especially foreign to the princess, who wore European-style clothing back home, but Kilcher's assignation of the fairer "ali'i" suggests that the filmmaker decided against addressing the young woman's "other-ness". Although Kaiulani should look English, she shouldn't literally be a descendant of Queen Victoria, which is how Kilcher plays the princess, as a "barbarian" without the slightest trepidation about gaining entree into a wholly new culture. Kaiulani seems bereft of royal carriage, giggling and mugging for Clive(Shaun Evans), lost as she is in the throes of love, despite her consciousness(that's why the opening scene proves to be problematic) of the governmental tumult back home, having been a first-hand witness to the king's premier being taken hostage at gunpoint by the Hawaiian League before her hasty departure. This big romance dominates "Princess Kaiulani", at the expense of detail surrounding the fallout from the Bayonet Constitution that resulted in the reigning queen(Liliokulani) being ousted from her dismantled court. The film conjures up emotional uplift(big rabble-rousing speeches, an appointment with President Cleveland, the restoration of her title, purely symbolic) to obscure the tragedy that befell the native population, who had lost their land to the missionaries(a fact that gets lost in Kaiulani's small victory of restoring the Hawaiian people's right to vote), and lives(due to disease transmitted from the newly minted foreign landowners). Not enough is made ado about this drastic transference of power. Worst of all, despite Clive being in cahoots with his family to deceive Kaiulani(who should have known that a coup was in the making), she accepts the British gentleman with open arms at her seaside "coronation", going so far as kissing him in front of her people during their darkest hours. That is not how a dethroned monarch would act. "Princess Kaiulani" treats the loss of her personal happiness and kingdom as commiserating catastrophes.
Being ethnic for an ethnic role, in this case, Hawaiian, is not nearly as important as acting certifiably ethnic, a non-Hawaiian with an authentic spirit, which is what Kilcher lacks, as a result of he filmmaker's passive attitude towards colonization.