'Ghost In The Shell' - Official Trailer + The film's director defends the "Whitewashing"

This sneak peek sure wets our appetite for more. Rupert Sanders directs, of "Snow White and the Huntsman," ahem, infamy, and if that isn't a red flag I don't know what is. Why did he get the job? There are so many more competent directors out there.  What we do know is that Scarlett's casting is gaining much controversy for whitewashing, however the rest of the cast, safe Juliette Binoche, is Japanese so it should be fine plus this is Scarlett freaking Joahnsson. Don't complain."

Sanders just yesterday defended the whitewashing in Tokyo:

“Scarlett was one of those people, and to me there’s very few actresses who’ve had 20 years of experience, who have the cyberpunk aesthetic already baked in. You know, she comes from such edgy films from Lost in Translation to Under the Skin — she’s got an incredible body of work and the attitude and toughness of her really is to me The Major.” 

“But also what she’s done incredibly in this film is she’s playing an android, she’s a synthetic body with a human mind inside. She did an incredible job of nuancing the human evolving through the machine, and in a way I think why it’s very relative to a large audience, it’s kind of a coming of age story and it’s a realization of ‘I am what I am — whatever’s happened to me, good or bad, that is the sum of who I am now.’” 

“I think whenever you cast someone someone’s going to be critical about it. To me it was, you know, I stand by my decision — she’s the best actress of her generation and I was flattered and honored that she would be in this film. So many people who were around the original anime have been vehemently in support of her because she’s incredible and there are very few like her.” 

The visuals look stunning and the overall style seems to be well rendered. My expectations have slightly increased.

The film will be released on March 31, 2017 in 2D, 3D and IMAX 3D.

Official synopsis:

"Cyborg policewoman The Major (Scarlett Johansson), and her task force Section 9 thwart cyber criminals and hackers. Now, they must face a new enemy who will stop at nothing to sabotage Hanka Robotic's artificial Intelligence technology."