Daily Archives: July 4, 2017

Disneys Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales opened at No. 1 in Japan over the July 1-2 weekend the best start for a foreign film so far this year.

Bowing on 989 screens on the first day of the month, when tickets are discounted at theaters across the country, the fifth installment in the Pirates series earned $9.25 million on 771,516 admissions. That was nearly the same number of admissions as for the previous installment, 2011s Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, which finished with $78 million in Japan.

At No. 2 was Tohos Mumon The Land of Stealth, Yoshihiro Nakamuras period actioner. Starring Satoshi Ono of mega-band Arashi,the film notched $4.3 million on 404,500 admissions. With Arashi fans driving the box office, the film is expected to finish near the $25-million mark.

Ranking at No. 3 was My Big Brother Loves Me So Much Its a Problem, a comedy based on a popular comic about a high school girl who has a stalwart protector in her older brother but who doesnt know they are unrelated by blood. Released on 251 screens on June 30 by Shochiku, the film earned $1.45 million on143,000 admissions, on its way to a hoped-for $10 million.

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'Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales' Opens at No. 1 in Japan - Variety

Trinidads semi-professional cricket, long a feeder for Caribbean cricketers to play broad, has lost of its lustre.

Caribbean cricket fans were dismayed in early June when, for the first time since the ICC Champions Trophy started in 1998, the West Indies Cricket Team did not qualify for this prestigious international competition, which recently concluded in England and Wales.

Winner of the Champions Trophy in 2004 and of the 1975 and 1979 World Cups, the West Indies squad is now at risk of not qualifying for the upcoming World Cup cricket competition in 2019.

Cricket lovers are struggling to understand the decline of the West Indies team, which is composed of athletes from 15 countries, British dependencies and other Caribbean territories, including Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana, Jamaica and Barbados.

In this region of the world, cricket has never been just a sport. In the 20th century struggle against British domination, cricket was central to the Caribbeans anticolonial independence project.

Today, my 2015 research in Guyana and Trinidad and Tobago found, its meaning has changed. For poor young men, international cricket is often seen as a way out of poverty and into the lap of luxury.

Originally introduced by British colonisers in the 19th century as an exclusively white male-dominated imperial sport, cricket quickly drew Afro-Caribbean players.

Afro-Caribbeans were allowed to join the West Indies Cricket Team in 1900, and by the 1940s they were numerically dominant. In 1960, an Afro-Caribbean man, Frank Worrell, became the first black captain of the West Indies Cricket Team.

Sir Frank Worrell, far right, in 1961.

A similar quest for belonging spurred the cricketing aspirations of Caribbeans of Indian descent, whose relatives had been brought to the region as indentured laborers after the abolition of slavery in 1834.

Indo-Caribbean players, who are now closely identified with cricket, especially in Guyana and Trinidad, also originally saw the sport as a vehicle for affirming an Indo-Caribbean identity.

Caribbean cricket narratives and histories tend to focus on the sports association with anti-colonial resistance and the efflorescence of a unified West Indian consciousness against the white planter class whats often called liberation cricket.

But contemporary Caribbean cricket is something quite different. Over the past two decades, globalisation and commercialisation of the sport have largely undone its political underpinnings.

The new story of cricket takes the form of Sukdeo Sisnarine, a 23-year-old aspiring Guyanese cricketer who plays in a Trinidadian domestic cricket league.

Adnan Hossain, Author provided

Sukdeo was connected to a cricket club through former players and arrived in Trinidad for his first stint after only a telephone conversation with a manager of the club, a common international recruitment practice in Trinidad.

Now he migrates to Trinidad from January to June each year to play. When I met him in a cricket club in 2015, it was his third sojourn there.

Guyanese are the largest group of overseas athletes playing in the Trinidadian cricket league; in 2015, nearly 25 of the 30 international players were from Guyana (the league has between one hundred or so cricketers in total).

Though geographically located in South America, Guyana is culturally Caribbean, and it is one of the poorest economies in the region, with an estimated per capita GDP of US$7,900 in 2016.

In contrast, Trinidad is one of the Caribbeans richest countries. Last year, its estimated GDP per person was $US31,900.

For cricketers from poorer Caribbean countries like Guyana, Trinidads semi-professional cricket league offers financial opportunities. Guyanese athletes can play competitive cricket while earning some extra money on the side.

Caribbean cricketers practicing in a Trinidadian cricket club.

Adnan Hossain, Author provided

When I knew him, Sukdeo was working in a car parts factory next to the cricket club he played for. He estimated his total earnings that season at about US$5,000.

This income allowed him to buy and do things that would have been impossible in Guyana, like going to the movies, purchasing designer sunglasses and choosing brand-name clothing.

Such consumer pleasures can come at a cost.

In Trinidad, the Guyanese are often portrayed as backwards, and people routinely mock the way they speak English, though they are native speakers. Small islanders, theyre called. Guyana is not an island, of course, let alone a small one. In Trinidad, this odd diminutive serves as a metaphor for the countrys poverty.

The economic disparity between the two countries produces social hierarchies, with Guyanese cricketers, as well as other male economic migrants, often seen in Trinidad as unwanted fortune-seekers.

This stereotype to some extent reflects the reality that for Sukdeo and many other young men I met in Trinidad, cricket is not so much a passion or a political statement as it is a professional pathway to wealth, conspicuous consumption and international travel all signs of success in this neoliberal world.

Trinidadian club managers and owners routinely recruit their Guyanese athletes to play for cricket leagues in Canada and the United States. In 2015, Sukdeo obtained visa sponsorship from a cricket club in Canada, allowing him to travel out of the Caribbean for the first time in his life.

Trinidad thus serves as a jumping-off point for Caribbean athletes who hope to emigrate, helping them to connect with the Caribbean diaspora in North America. In the US alone, there are an estimated 4 million Caribbean immigrants.

Still, Sukdeo didnt want to be in Trinidad or in Canada for that matter. He wanted to be recruited for the Indian Premier League (IPL), the most expensive cricket franchise in the world since its inception in 2008.

The IPL, which changed the format of the game to shorten day-long matches, boasts massive injections of corporate capital, Bollywood-star team owners, foreign cheerleaders and world-calibre cricketers. It has radically repackaged cricket as high-paced glamorous entertainment.

Prior to the IPL, players from the West Indies Cricket Team politically-minded men like Sir Vivian Richards and Clive Lloyd were the role models for aspiring young Caribbean cricketers like Sukdeo.

Today, its the lavish lifestyle of IPL athletes that most appeal.

Once a site for anti-colonial resistance and consolidation of a West Indian identity, contemporary Caribbean cricket is devoid of such political connotations.

This paradigmatic shift may account for the sad state of the West Indies cricket team this year. It seems that neoliberal cricket just cant compete with the liberation cricket of yore.

This article is written in collaboration with the Global Sport Project, an anthropology research initiative (University of Amsterdam).

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

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Can Caribbean cricket get its (political) groove back? - HuffPost

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The scene is controversial, but so is the fix, apparently.

Disney has announced plans to clean up the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at its theme parks, losing the Wench Auction in favor of a more politically correct depiction.

For over 50 years, the iconic ride has included a scene featuring animatronic women being sold in an auction under a banner that reads, Auction, take a wench for a bride.

"We believe the time is right to turn the page to a new story in this scene consistent with the humorous, adventurous spirit of the attraction," Suzi Brown, a spokeswoman for Disneyland Resort, told CNN.

The scene is getting a PC makeover with a new banner that will read, Auction, Surrender Yer Loot. Itll feature both men and women surrendering goods such as art and clocks. One thing that will remain the same is the fan favorite redheaded animatronic character, only now, shell be in charge.

The Pirates of the Caribbean ride was the last one that Walt Disney himself oversaw before he died in 1966, and is the basis of the popular movie franchise starring Johnny Depp.

While many people are happy with Disneys decision to adjust to modern times, there are still some critics who argue it shouldnt be changing such a historical and classic ride. Its definitely a hot topic debate on social media right now.

This isnt the first time Disney has changed the ride. In 1997, it put food in the hands of the animatronic women so that it appeared the men were lusting and chasing after the grub instead of the ladies.

And of course, "The Simpsons" predicted all of this would happen:

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Disney to clean up Pirates of the Caribbean ride to make it more PC - Today.com

Fort Lauderdale Daily

Nevis: The Undiscovered Caribbean Island Only A Short Flight Away From Miami Fort Lauderdale Daily When deciding on a Caribbean vacation, Floridians tend to hop over to well-known tourist destinations like The Bahamas, Jamaica or the Dominican Republic, which are bustling with all-inclusive resorts and tourist traps. But for those looking to escape ... Retiring in the CaribbeanThe Times (subscription) all 6 news articles »

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Nevis: The Undiscovered Caribbean Island Only A Short Flight Away From Miami - Fort Lauderdale Daily