While the movie is set in a city based on Baghdad, Iraq, Aladdin contains aspects of multiple Middle Eastern and Asian cultures. The sultan's palace in Aladdin, left, and the Taj Mahal in Agra, India.
In fact, records show that the folktale on which Disney's Aladdin is based is originally set in China, and later mixed with a story set in Persia as told by a Syrian woman, then translated and added to 1001 Arabian Nights by a French man, adding to the layers of cultural conflation and Orientalism at play.
The reason we think of the story as one of the true-born Arabian Nights is that many of the characters in the tale of Aladdin are Arabian Muslims with Arabic names. But Aladdin is Chinese … at least, he is if you go back to the known origins of the story.
3. Aladdin doesn't come from Agrabah. In the both Galland's text and Richard Burton's popular 1885 English translation, Aladdin lives “in a city of the cities in China.” Illustrations of the tales from the Victorian era depict the story and its characters as Chinese.
While some claim Jasmine is Arab because the movie opens with a song called Arabian Nights, others believe that the architecture in Agrabah is clearly based on the Taj Mahal, making Jasmine Indian. It's a debate that has fueled speculation that in Hollywood, Indians and Arabs are interchangeable.
Will Smith - Arabian Nights (2019) (From "Aladdin"/Audio Only)
What is Aladdin race?
1. The original Aladdin was actually Chinese. While the true origins of the tale of Aladdin cannot be completely verified, the story is often attributed to French writer Antoine Galland, who claimed a Syrian told him about a boy and a genie in China.
If Ritchie's film was based on the original story, the entire cast would be Chinese - apart from the sorcerer, who would be North African - but as it's said to be a faithful remake of Disney's animation, Aladdin and Princess Jasmine should really be Middle Eastern or South Asian, despite the film not being an authentic ...
On Oct. 15, Disney Plus introduced a new disclaimer that appears before older films like Dumbo (1941) and Aladdin (1992), warning viewers that the films include harmful stereotypes. The new message replaces the one that came with the original launch of Disney Plus late last year.
Given the grand context of the narrative of the story, the cultural framework of the setting, the times for which the author wrote the story, and the name in of itself of Aladdin, it is a fair to assume that he like most of the fictional cast of The Arabian Nights is a Muslim.
Aladdin is a young man from a Chinese/Cathay town tricked by a sorcerer from Maghreb (North Africa). While the setting is in China, most of the characters of the story are moslems, which suggests that the setting is probably in Turkestan (from Central Asia to Modern China's province of Xinjiang).
Final Verdict. With everything we have to go off of, Aladdin is set in the 15th century in the Ottoman Empire. With Agrabah seemingly being in a desert, I initially set this movie in 1521 after the conquest of Cairo and the areas of Arabia that bordered the Red Sea.
I used to have this Ali Baba story book when I was a kid and all the buildings and characters in the book were drawn like East Asian, except for the leader of the 40 thieves, who was dark and South Asian looking.
Here are 5: Dumbo (1941): Contains a scene of a group of cigar-smoking crows, with their leader named Jim Crow, referring to the racist segregation laws of the South, and voiced by a white actor.
Violent references and undressing references have been edited for the Disney+ release. One of the lyrics in "Arabian Nights" that said "Where they cut off your ear if they don't like your face." were replaced by one that said "Where it's flat and immense and the heat is intense".
Comic Book Resources discusses that one possible reason the show is currently absent is the Genie's many pop culture references, which may violate certain streaming rights.
In the collection of tales recorded around the 15th century in Arabic, and which comprise "The Thousand and One Nights" or "Arabian Nights," Aladdin and Jasmine were actually residents of Baghdad, Iraq, a city widely considered a center for Arab culture and civilization.
Mena Massoud (Aladdin) is Egyptian, Nasim Pedrad (Jasmine's handmaiden) and Navid Negahban (the Sultan) are Iranian and Marwan Kenzari (Jafar) is Tunisian. Interestingly though, Naomi Scott (Jasmine) is a British actress whose mom is Ugandan with Indian decent, neither of which are Middle Eastern.
The rise of our current era of big names plastered over animated film posters has been traced back to Robin Williams in the 1992 Aladdin. And it's that same Aladdin that gives Tom Cruise a connection — albeit a loose one — to animation: he was actually a model for the main character.
The key protagonist of both films is male (Figure 3). Although it may be argued that the newer version tries to put more of a spotlight on Jasmine, Aladdin is the central focus of the movie.
The original story of 'Aladdin' is, maybe surprisingly, set in China. In the earliest versions of the story, Aladdin is Chinese. He's also not an orphaned street urchin but a lazy boy living at home with his mother. All the characters in the tale are also Chinese apart from the wicked magician who is from North Africa.
But still, that doesn't mean when you're watching a favorite like "Aladdin" you're actually conscious of the fact that Jasmine is actually only 15 years old, which would result in Aladdin getting arrested in just about every state in the Union. Or that Snow White is just 14.
Mena Massoud played a live-action version of the character in a live action adaptation of the 1992 film. When Aladdin is initially introduced, he is an 18-year-old man.
Agrabah is a fictional sultanate that serves as the setting for the Aladdin franchise. Aladdin was initially intended to be set in the Iraqi city of Baghdad, but after the Gulf War happened, the name Agrabah was chosen as an approximate anagram of the name of the city of Baghdad.
