Netflix is facing criticism this week over their promotion and description of the French film "Cuties".
According to Netflix, "The story centres on Amy, an 11-year-old being raised in a traditional Senegalese Muslim household, who is caught between traditional values and internet culture which focuses on the hyper-sexualisation of girls after she joins a group of dancers named ‘the cuties' at school, and rapidly grows aware of her burgeoning femininity."
Outrage started to pour in after people began comparing the Netflix movie poster with the original French movie poster. The Netflix poster shows Amy and her "cuties" wearing booty shorts and crop tops, with knee pads, as they cut sexy dance poses under the backdrop of stage lights. Needless to say, the image has caused a great deal of outrage on social media. It's so blatantly bad, we won't continue to host the image here on our site, but will instead allow you to follow the link to another news outlet's article if you feel so inclined.
Compare THAT nonsense to the original French poster below, which is more lighthearted and shows the girls laughing, toting shopping bags, and dressed with bras and underwear over their clothes.
This article also describes the differences in the synopsis of the film, which was later updated by Netflix due to the outrage. An original tagline stated, "Amy, 11, becomes fascinated with a twerking dance crew. Hoping to join them, she starts to explore her femininity, defying her family's traditions."
The updated tagline now reads: "Eleven-year-old Amy starts to rebel against her conservative family's traditions when she becomes fascinated with a free-spirited dance crew."
In a statement to Metro.co.uk, Netflix said: "This was not an accurate representation of the film, so the image and description have been updated."
According to the article, many are defending the film while criticizing the Netflix promotion, describing the film as "exposing the dangers young girls face while growing up in the age of hyper-sexualized social media culture rather than being about a girl who hides that she loves to"twerk" from her conservative immigrant family."
Not really sure what Netflix was going for here.
In response to the outrage, Netflix has (kind of) apologized on Twitter, however it remains to be seen if they continue to move forward with releasing the film, which seems to glorify the very thing it claims to criticize.
