'Aloha', the new film from Cameron Crowe ('Almost Famous', 'Jerry Maguire'), opens this weekend in North America, and arrives in cinemas amid controversy and middling reviews. The film stars Bradley Cooper as a military contractor sent to Hawaii, where he falls for Emma Stone's Air Force pilot. 

Emma Stone and Bradley Cooper star in 'Aloha'Emma Stone and Bradley Cooper star in 'Aloha'

Critics have called it charming but meandering and unfocussed. But the problems began at the end of last year, when the Sony hackers released a memo in which the studio's chair Amy Pascal wrote about the film: "I'm never starting a movie again when the script is this ridiculous.... It never not even once works."

Then earlier this month the Media Action Network for Asian Americans attacked the film for having an overwhelmingly white cast, citing Hollywood's terrible track record, including 'The Descendants', '50 First Dates', 'Blue Crush' and 'Pearl Harbor'. They said 'Aloha' "uses Hawaii for its exotic backdrop but goes out of its way to exclude the very people who live there".

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Sony reacted by noting that this criticism came after merely watching the trailer, not the movie itself. "Filmmaker Cameron Crowe spent years researching this project and many months on location in Hawaii, cultivating relationships with leading local voices," Sony officials wrote. "He earned the trust of many Hawaiian community leaders, including Dennis 'Bumpy' Kanahele, who plays a key role in the film." Indeed, the film includes key characters and plotlines involving Asia-Pacific islanders.

Meanwhile, Cooper and Stone have been out promoting 'Aloha', talking about how beautiful Hawaii is. "It's ridiculous," says Cooper. "The first day there was a double rainbow, two rainbows occurring simultaneously, I was like, 'This is amazing! It's like seeing a comet!' And then two days later there was another one, and then twice in one day. And after a week I'm going, 'Yeah whatever with the double rainbow. Enough already.'"

Watch The Trailer For 'Aloha' Here:

"We got sick of all that natural beauty," Stone laughs. "We all had a pretty great time."

And both think the film will click with audiences. "There's lots of elements I think people could enjoy," Stone says. "It's a beautiful location, and of course a story written and directed by Cameron Crowe."

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Cooper agrees. "While we were making it there was a kind of magical quality to the way he writes," he says. "It's like a great escapism: you feel like you walk into this world that he creates and you leave feeling better."