The streaming service Netflix is facing a mountain of intense backlash after releasing the controversial film “Cuties.”
Initially, the company was criticized for publishing artwork depicting the French film’s characters — all underage girls — in sexually suggestive poses and revealing outfits. Netflix pulled the poster in late August, claiming at the time its depiction wasn’t representative of the film’s content.
It turns out, Netflix was right: the film is much worse than the poster.
“This is legitimate child porn,” wrote Jason Howerton, a father and conservative media personality, after seeing a brief clip from the film showing the scantily clad, 11-year-old girls performing erotic dance moves. “I am [expletive] raging.”
Unfortunately, Howerton’s description isn’t exaggerated.
According to the IMDb parents guide, the sex and nudity in the movie is “severe.”
“During one of the many highly sexualized [and] erotic dance scenes that purposefully exploit [and] objectify numerous scantily clad under age girls, one of the female child dancers lifts up her cropped top to fully display her bare breast,” reads the database’s parental warning. “This is lawfully defined as pedophilia and can be extremely distressing to many viewers.”
The IMDb guide also includes a “trigger warning,” describing a scene in which one of the prepubescent girls watches a female-led rap video during which “naked women role play through dance both heterosexual [and] lesbian sex acts.” The group of girls then mimic the actions they watched.
Throughout, the film includes “lengthy [and] excessive closeup shots of breasts, bums, and spread crotches of scantily clad 11-year-old girls during numerous sexualized dance routines,” according to the guide.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, while the critic reviews for the film are at an astounding 90% positive, according to Rotten Tomatoes, audience reviews for “Cuties” are only at 6%.
In the hours since the film debuted on Netflix Wednesday, the hashtags #CancelNetflix and #BoycottNetflix have started trending on Twitter.
Here is a sampling of some of the tweets:
Former U.S. Ambassador to Germany Richard Grennell asked Thursday whether reporters plan to seek a response to the film from former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice, who was appointed to the Netflix board of directors in 2018.