In an interview in this week’s issue of Variety the director of the new movie Exodus answered questions about the controversies revolving around the new film. Due out Christmas time Exodus is yet another telling of the biblical story of the Exodus from Egypt.
One of the so called controversies deals with the director having cast white actors in many of the roles. Some people think that all of the ancient Egyptians were black or at the very least brown.
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In response to this Scott told Variety, ” Egypt was –- as it is now -– a confluence of cultures, as a result of being a crossroads geographically between Africa, the Middle East and Europe. We cast major actors from different ethnicities to reflect this diversity of culture, from Iranians to Spaniards to Arabs. There are many different theories about the ethnicity of the Egyptian people, and we had a lot of discussions about how to best represent the culture.”
Scott also explained that he made the movie with the presumption that all of the events described in the bible actually took place saying, “ “Once I accept that, how do I proceed, with the greatest respect to the story? It’s so easy to (give the finger) to religions, and we’ve kind of got to stop that. If you believe, you believe; if you’re faithful, you’re faithful. I don’t care what your religion is. The same if you’re agnostic. That should be accepted too.”