"Couples Retreat" Poster In UK Removes Black Couple

Universal changed "Couples Retreat" marketing material for the film's UK release, and removed the black actors from both the poster's photo and the list of stars typed out.

The film, which features four couples who go on vacation together, costars Faizon Love as a divorced man who takes his new girlfriend along, played by Kali Hawk.

Below are the UK (left) and the US (right) poster.

The Mail on Sunday reports:

The studio said it regretted causing offence and has abandoned plans to use the revised poster in other countries... A Universal spokesman said the revised advert aimed 'to simplify the poster to actors who are most recognisable in international markets'.

Comments

[hunnybunny123]

05:36 PM on 12/14/2009

I agree with Dana in the sense that the UK is prejudiced against Muslims and Asian people in general, BUT (and this is a big BUT) people in the UK are extremely RACIST towards black people. I am white and English and I am married to a black man, and I can tell you one thing that not many foriegners know - English people are POLITE. English people smile and laugh with you as they stab you in the back. Trust me. I've been egged for being with my husband, sacked for being with my husband, and EVERY job I have had has been racist - because when the black people leave the room everyone thinks it's ok to be racist (because I'm white so I won't mind). Well I mind. People don't realise what England's like, and I've realised the harsh truth of this country since I've been disowned by my own people for marrying outside of 'my' race. Perhaps everyone thinks America is worse because people there speak their minds more frequently­, but there is NO WAY that a mixed race man would ever become Prime Minister in the UK. There is no black leader of any sort that the British people have voted for, and it's not because they're not good. Obama would never have had a chance here! This is all something that Hollywood obvioulsy understand­s, as they realised that by taking out the black people they make the film far more appealing to an English

[cgoodie]

03:05 PM on 11/18/2009

And besides, their is a lot less r a ci sm in Europe than here.

[Georgiapundit]

11:39 PM on 11/19/2009

Who are you fooling? The Jamaicans in GB tell a different story, along with the Muslims in France. By the way, Europeans seem to have ALWAYS hated Jews. What about the poor migrant South Asian workers? Did you ever check with them before you posted this lofty comment?

[cgoodie]

03:03 PM on 11/18/2009

Ok, so we're supposed to believe that a production company that hired and paid two black people to star in a movie are now ra cist because they are excluded from a poster. Give me a break. The media again trying to stir up h a t e and controvers­y.

[pixelslinger]

01:48 PM on 11/18/2009

They're barely in the American poster!

[cgoodie]

03:00 PM on 11/18/2009

That's because of their star power, NOt their race.

[TheInsomniac]

03:44 PM on 11/18/2009

And they are only in the movie to be the token black couple.

[melamia]

04:25 AM on 11/18/2009

I'm sorry...bu­t who cares? Don't we have anything more significan­t to focus our energy on than a movie poster? Seems like people are sitting around, waiting for something to be offended by, while there are more pressing issues in the world that need our attention. In fact, I'm going to pay attention to something significan­t now...

[m66]

02:57 PM on 11/18/2009

Most thinking adults believe race to be a significan­t issue. Except r.a.c.i.s.­t.s.

[TheInsomniac]

03:44 PM on 11/18/2009

Yeah, there must be another Balloon Boy around. Or maybe Sarah Palin sneezed.

[CoronaDischarge]

12:26 AM on 11/18/2009

Sounds to me like it's marketing, more than it's racism. If there is a racist conclusion to be drawn, it's the market that's speaking, not the advertiser­s who are looking not to make social commentary so much as simply making the most money off the advertisin­g dollars they spend. You can damn the company, but I think it says more about the market for the film. Since the ad is not seen as politicall­y correct now, then of course they changed it, as the negatives of that notoriety outweigh any other benefit of their advertisin­g experience­.

[m66]

01:03 AM on 11/19/2009

You do realize marketing can be racist? And often is?

[jctripp]

12:13 AM on 11/18/2009

When's the last time you analyzed a film poster? When's the last time you even looked at one? This is funny, all of a sudden people are upset over this stuff. Well, as a photoshop retoucher for the largest ad agency in the world (a French company) I will tell you this: every single image you see in an ad is manipulate­d. EVERY SINGLE ONE. Some are more obvious and rankle people but there are all sorts of subtle manipulati­ons going on. A lot of the models you think you know only exist digitally! If you saw them in person you wouldn't even recognize them, especially celebrity models. So deal with it, there's nothing new here. What if they were white, would anyone care then? That happens too.

[Dana Seilhan]

11:47 PM on 11/17/2009

And, they didn't just take out the black couple. Look again at the layout. They rearranged a few of the other actors. It's a different picture entirely--­they took the individual people's images and Photoshopp­ed them around. Even the background is different. It still sucks that they left out the black couple but at the same time, they may have kept actors on the poster who had higher billing. There could very well still be (American) racism going on here on several levels but some of it is simply that there wasn't room for all four couples. But they could have left out anybody.

[Dana Seilhan]

11:44 PM on 11/17/2009

Well, let's see. The UK banned slavery before we did, interracia­l marriage is more acceptable in the UK than it is here and if I'm not mistaken, they seem to have more prominent black actors in at least television roles than we have here, or the shows in which they appear seem to be more mainstream­. If there's a racism problem, I don't think it exists so much in the UK. At most they're prejudiced against more recent Muslim immigrants from the Middle East, Africa, and Asia, but it's hard to say how much of that is racism and how much of it is creedism or simply prejudice against strangers.

Universal, on the other hand, is an American corporatio­n. And we DO have a racism problem here.

[Rharte]

11:31 PM on 11/17/2009

This looks like something right out of "The Boondocks" cartoon. How come the (black) couple are way far behind in the original poster? Also does anyone find it funny that we need a giant orange arrow to point us in the right direction? I mean it's not like we would have a hard time finding the only black couple on the poster.

Ok. I'm obviously having too much fun with this story.

[Rharte]

11:20 PM on 11/17/2009

"A Universal spokesman said the revised advert aimed 'to simplify the poster to actors who are most recognisab­le in internatio­nal markets'."

So why is Vince Vaughn on the cover?

[whitemerlot]

10:40 PM on 11/17/2009

Here's where I stand- I've never heard of 3 of the white people as well as both black people in the original poster. Would "simplifyi­ng" things by eliminatin­g all of the unknown people make me want to see the movie any more than not? No. They obviously calculated that removing the (black) couple would draw in a larger audience- the question is: is that marginal increase in audience size due to a racist element that would otherwise not see the movie if they saw black people in the movie poster? If so, I actually applaud the movie company for duping the racists and making them pay for a movie ticket for a movie that they otherwise would not have seen. A racist that is $10 poorer is a poorer racist.

[CanadianBeef]

11:37 PM on 11/17/2009

They should've removed the whole film rather than tampered with the package. That movie s.u.c.k.s like a tornado.

[akkadian]

09:03 PM on 11/17/2009

There must have been a meeting, complete with flipchart, Powerpoint and minutes.
So who was that guy?

[Rharte]

11:18 PM on 11/17/2009

There definitely was a meeting.

[Courtney Smither]

06:23 PM on 11/17/2009

They are two entirely different posters. Do you really think the couple was left out on purpose? Where is the proof of this?

[Abouttogiveup]

08:46 PM on 11/17/2009

The proof is that that two people are missing from the second poster, and the statement from Universal saying the they were taken out on purpose. That stated intent was market the well known actors to foreign fans. If your taken off of posters your chances of becoming one of the well known actors are reduced. Was the intent to be intentiona­lly racist? Probably not. However, the end result was racist (who can we market and to whom?). Why would there be a need to change different posters in London and East LA? At best it was an innocent act fostered by faulty thought processes, and just as harmful to the actors omitted as it would have been had the act been intentiona­l.

[irstyno]

09:59 PM on 11/17/2009

Sorry, but this kind of thing happens all the time with advertisin­g for both movies and video games. The only reason this was noticed is because it happened to be a black couple that was removed. You ask why a different poster is needed in Britain? Easy. Marketing designs and gimmicks might work in one culture but not in another. Different posters are routinely used in different countries. Sometimes the film is even renamed in order to market it better in another country. (Example: US: Pirate Radio, UK: The Boat That Rocked)

[mmgbizgirl]

04:43 PM on 11/17/2009

No one should be surprised by this.