The use of Chinese actresses as lead characters in the movie Geisha has caused a stir in both Japan and China, as well as in the blogosphere.

AsiaPundit doesn’t care!

To make a controversial comment, the physical differences between the peoples of the three main Northeast Asian nations are so minimal that it should make no difference to Hollywood casting directors for a English-language movie. For instance, AP isn’t the slightest bit perturbed to see Daniel Dae Kim cast as a Chinese Shaolin monk or a caucasian starship captain.

AP has spent almost a decade in the region and can fairly easily tell when someone is from Korea, China or Japan. For that matter, its easy to guess whether an ethnic Chinese person is from Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan, the Mainland or elsewhere. This, however, is more often because of behavior, style of dress, language and accent than it is by physical appearance.

AsiaPundit has had Canadian Chinese friends in Korea who needed to, repeatedly, convince Koreans that they did not speak the language and were not ethnically Korean. I know ethnic Koreans who must do the reverse in China. Further, at the recent anti-Japanese protest in Shanghai, AP met Japanese consular staff and reporters who were in the crowd passing themselves off as Chinese simply by altering their style of dress. Quite simply, Northeast Asians can’t tell the difference between each other either.

Now, before posting any nasty responses, please do this short quiz at AllLookSame.com.

AsiaPundit admits to scoring a dismal, but above average, eight out of 18.

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