Wait, what agenda do you think the reviewer has? The same one as the director, who is trying to fight the sexualization of young girls?
Your eyes saw something disturbing. It was supposed to be disturbing.
Netflix Will Not Be Woke
- Thread starter Chevaker
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Your eyes saw something disturbing. It was supposed to be disturbing.
You’re doing the exact same thing the movie is doing by posting the picture. Portrayals aren’t simple arguments in favor of what’s portrayed.Just to be clear, you think Cuties is not exposing children appropriately?
If you’re worried about some kind of agenda on the part of the other reviewer, how about a review from a conservative critic?
I have a general rule: I consider judging a movie based on ads and trailers or waging a jihad against it based on a review you’ve read before seeing the movie in question to be an unserious way to discuss art. I thought the same thing years ago when Glenn Greenwald and others went to war against Zero Dark Thirty. And yet, when I saw the trailer and poster for Cuties—which posited the film as, more or less, Twerk Up 2 the Streets, Tweens—I was … kind of aghast? I didn’t weigh in one way or the other at the time because, again, my general rule.
But the ads were so fundamentally terrible that Ted Sarandos literally apologized to the director for the marketing, marketing that was so off-key and off-putting that it inspired a vociferous response from conservatives online. (Critics who think the angry reaction against this movie is simply a function of QAnon need to get out of their bubble a bit more.) And I don’t think anyone should be shocked that Netflix — which has positioned itself as entertainment for everyone, hoping to be in every home available on every tablet — is taking it on the chin for marketing Cuties like a sexy tween dance off competition movie.
Which brings me back to the question of art and its purpose. If this movie was made for no other purpose than to entertain — if the Cuties were your standard hardscrabble heroes attempting to win a dance competition by looking like 11-year-old hookers; if this were just Step up 2: The Streets for the pedo set — then people would be right to freak out. It would be horrifyingly immoral. There would be no defense of it.
This movie is not that, though. Even if it falters — and, again, I think it does! — in its depiction of these girls, Cuties is trying to tell us that we, as a society, have royally messed up. It is holding up a mirror and showing us what we are. And if you’re a conservative sitting there screaming “We don’t need to be shown its bad, we know it’s bad!” consider, for a moment, that you are not the target audience here and that there are people who need to see what the sexualization of our children is doing to them.
So you watched the movie?
They could have blurred the 11 year olds genitals and still achieved the same effect.
What is up here. How old are you?
Why didn’t you blur whatever you seemed to have noticed when you posted the picture?
So then the answer to your question is yes. Since you didn’t watch the movie yourself, you should take the opinion of those who did watch it more seriously than your own opinion about the movie that you did not watch.
Also, you’re in here talking about this movie being about normalizing pedophilia and being a movie made specifically for pedophiles, yet you’re posting stills from that movie? I’m assuming this also means you’re googling the movie, searching for pictures from it? Or were they already saved on your computer?
I, personally, have not seen the movie and do not plan to watch it. I also won’t be obsessively searching for pictures from the movie to post on message boards.
So… the opinion you have is based on someone else’s opinion? You’ve not confirmed it one way or the other?
So, there’s a chance @ChicagoTiger85 is right?
I mean, I’m 100% right that the movie isn’t trying to promote pedophilia or normalize it. There’s no questioning that. You can find plenty of stuff from the people who made the movie, and it’s pretty clear from the plot of the film that’s not what it’s about.
I personally don’t think they should’ve depicted things as explicitly as they did, even though the girls were (scantily) clothed. Maybe there was another way to do what the director wanted to do. But she certainly succeeded in disturbing people with the things she thought were disturbing.
Hey guys, you do whatever you want. I really don’t care if we agree.
Normal people don’t need a production telling us sexualization of prepubescent girls is bad.
Do you think sexualization of young girls is happening? And is it all being done explicitly? If you think it’s happening despite it not always being the intention of advertisers and others to sexualize girls this young, then it’s a problem that people need to be more aware of. Everyone agrees that young girls shouldn’t be dressed like this or act like this. But how wok do they get the idea that they need to? How are they being confused by what they see and what they’re told? That’s what the movie’s about, and in fact the movie actually portrays everyone who sees what these girls do as being disturbed by it. But they didn’t see how the girls were influenced in that direction, either.
Now, Netflix deserves criticism for leading with the most disturbing parts of the movie in its advertising for it. But they actually ended up apologizing to the director for doing that.
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@Cris_Ard please clean up this recurring mess on the board, sir. The board is going to shit, sir.
Thank you
Thank you
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My favorite part of all this is you are accidentally proving the point @ChicagoTiger85 is making. He’s saying that the purpose of the movie and its imagery is to show how gross it is to sexual children. And you’re posting still from that movie in order to argue that….its gross to sexualize children. Seems like the movie has done exactly what it intended to do.
Although I do find your obsession with this movie and pictures from it a bit odd, especially since you claim its a movie made for pedophiles. Question: do you live within 1,000 Feet of a school?
Oh, I wasn’t questioning you. Only tagged you for context.
I’ve not seen the show, so I don’t have an opinion on it.
lol. Your favorite part?
Anyway, do you honestly need a movie to tell you that underage girls shouldn't be sexualized…? REALLY?? So your reason for showing a movie sexualizing 11 year olds is so that somebody doesn’t get it into their mind to do so?
Also, I never said it was a movie made for pedophiles. Stick to the facts.
I don’t have a reason fro showing a movie sexualizing 11 year Olds. Never seen it, never shown it to anyone, never really even thought about it until it came up in this thread.
Your reason for positing pictures of sexualized 11 year olds is so that somebody doesn’t get it into their mind to watch a movie sexualizing 11 year olds?
Stills vs moving stills.
Quite a difference.
One proves intent, the other proves desire.
Well, this thread took an unexpected turn. I am a Netflix subscriber and was unaware of the apparently controversial film Cuties.
There had been threads on here regarding the Chappelle special that triggered the employees and this was meant as a follow-up.
I am pleased that companies like Netflix and Spotify are not just rolling over to the cancel culture. I believe in the free market. If you don't like the content then don't subscribe or work there, but don't try to eliminate all content that you don't agree with. I am sure there is a lot of content that I wouldn't like, but I just move on to what interests me. If I felt Netflix was pushing an agenda of pedophilia or anti-trans I would cancel.
I am also glad Netflix is standing up to the employees. It is not like they are workers in Sinclair's The Jungle. It seems like the pendulum has swung too far in the other direction.
There had been threads on here regarding the Chappelle special that triggered the employees and this was meant as a follow-up.
I am pleased that companies like Netflix and Spotify are not just rolling over to the cancel culture. I believe in the free market. If you don't like the content then don't subscribe or work there, but don't try to eliminate all content that you don't agree with. I am sure there is a lot of content that I wouldn't like, but I just move on to what interests me. If I felt Netflix was pushing an agenda of pedophilia or anti-trans I would cancel.
I am also glad Netflix is standing up to the employees. It is not like they are workers in Sinclair's The Jungle. It seems like the pendulum has swung too far in the other direction.
This thread needs to be taken out back and shot. What in the world.
Netflix is moving back due to its very disappointing financial results. They funneled millions to Obummer to make shows and the results are coming in. People will not watch stuff thats not entertaining and stuff that is loaded with attempted social programming. Unfortunately 90% of TV nowadays contains attempted social programming.
Better than the programming from right wing media that results in the murder of 10 people at a grocery store yesterday.
Yeah, I doubt that. Liberals say lots of things, like how they're so tolerant, or how they care about the working class, but actions speak louder than words.
Preach
... its just completely out of touch with reality and everyday life. I lean Right, but ... I could lean left, on specific issues, and workers rights is one of those issues.
When I worked for our Airports organization, I had to be very familiar with European Labor Laws. When you compare how companies in Europe have to treat their employees and how employees are treated in the US, there really is no comparison, from a job security and benefits perspective.
For example ... if my company won a contract at an Airport here in the states that required onsite dedicated support (onsite technicians), I could layoff the entire existing staff and bring in a whole new team in order to meet the "price" I bid the job for. Now ... in reality I would never lay off the entire team, because ... ummmmm .... experience and institutional knowledge, soooooo I would keep 1 or two senior folks, a couple of junior folks, offer up positions to the others at the salary I bid the job for and if they didnt accept, toooo bad sooooo sad. In Europe, I cant do that because of the TUPE regulation. I have to hire the existing team, at their current rate of pay OR buy them out and pay them to go away. Only way I could operate in the EU, the same way I operated in the States is if I could prove that the job description and required skills were drastically different ..... this led to heated...discussions ... with sales guys who wanted to bid jobs as cheaply as possible in order to win business.... of course these were the same F*ers who could never tell me or articulate what the "Price to Win" was...... any ways, topic for another thread.... Im rambling now.
If Dems hammered this (among other things), it would grab my attention for sure ..... but instead, they appear to fight more passionately for boutique identity politic issues and social justice that in the grand scheme dont matter.
What liberals? The woman who made the movie is an early 30s first-generation Senegalese Frenchwoman whose parents were polygamous Muslims.
Another weird post.Here’s an excerpt from a positive review (written by a woman, about a movie made by a woman, about girls) just to help you understand what the movie is about:
Near the end of Cuties, its 11-year-old heroines take the stage at a dance competition with a routine that wouldn't be out of place in a strip club. Clad in sparkly short-shorts and crop tops, they hump the floor, grab their crotches, lick their lips, and throw their heads back in a naive simulation of sex, to the visible discomfort of their audience.
It's possibly the film's most disturbing scene, and for some reason, it's also the scene Netflix chose to highlight in their early marketing, sparking an outcry they should've seen coming from a mile away. (The company has since apologized.) What both the ill-conceived marketing and subsequent controversy are missing, however, is everything about the context.
Yes, it's upsetting, and it's supposed to be — because the whole point of Cuties is how damn hard it can be for girls to navigate womanhood in a society that's all too eager to tell girls and women what they should be, and not at all interested in what they might be or want to be.
Written and directed by Maïma Doucouré, Cuties is the story of Amy (Fathia Youssouf), who's just immigrated to Paris from Senegal with her devout Muslim mother and two younger brothers. While the family waits for Dad to join them, Amy becomes intrigued by a neighbor, Angelica (Médina El Aidi-Azouni), whom she (and we) first see from the back, gyrating to music in skintight pants and a belly-baring shirt. It's a mild surprise when she turns around and we see she's Amy's age. Angelica and her friends, the Cuties, come across as cool and worldly to the sheltered Amy, in ways Amy's conservative family would never approve of. Which, of course, is part of the appeal.
… But in both horrific scenes and adorable ones, what remains consistent is Doucouré's honesty. She shows these moments as they are, in all their silliness and ugliness, without packaging them in easy moralizing or faux empowerment. Amy's attempts to put on a more grown-up sexuality may be unsettling to watch, but they're also true to a world that bombards girls with the message that, whether they cover up or bare it all, keep their heads down and cook or shake their asses on the dance floor, womanhood is whatever men need it to be. That climactic scene of her writhing on stage isn't about showing Amy as a sexual being, but about taking to task a culture that struggles to see young women any other way.
Rather than deny those harsh truths, Cutiesgives Amy and her friends the space to experiment within them, no matter how clumsily and misguidedly, and no matter how upsetting we in the audience might find it. By doing so, Doucouré extends to these girls a generosity that, as we've seen in the film, is so often denied them by the rest of the world — the freedom to figure out how they want to navigate it.
