Sorry, but the criticism is warranted. The issue isn't so black and white (pun intended). The peoples of north Africa are not "black" as sub-Saharan Africans are. Egyptians, Arabs, Berbers, all look a lot more like Mediterranean Europeans and Levantines than they do sub-Saharan Africans. And Cleopatra, along with her whole dynasty, was Greek for pity's sake. In ancient Egyptian art, the Egyptians portrayed themselves with coppery or reddish or swarthy skin. But they also depicted the Nubians -- who were black, sub-Saharan Africans -- in their art, and they depicted them with very dark, almost black skin.
This issue wouldn't bother us so much of the film industry weren't so clearly pushing an agenda, and if it weren't so obviously a one way street. Achilles, Anne Boleyn, Cleopatra, Zeus, Guinevere, Joan of Arc, Margaret of Anjou, Friar Tuck, Robert de Beaumont, et al. there is a whole list of unquestionably white historical or quasi-historical characters who have been played by black actors in recent productions. But if you were to make a film and cast a white performer as a non-white character... Well, that draws screams of outrage; Kate Bosworth, Scarlett Johansson, and Gal Gadot have all drawn harsh criticism for this -- and in Gadot's case, for playing Cleopatra who was white, though many ignorant people seem not to understand this.
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