An open-air screening of the Barbie movie in a Paris suburb was reportedly cancelled after young muslims sent threats over the screening, claiming the film was “promoting homosexuality” and “undermining the integrity of women.”
The Oscar-winning box office hit has ignited a new culture war in France as prosecutors open an inquiry into the threats that halted the screening.
The free screening was set to be held in Noisy-le-Sec, in the Seine-Saint-Denis département, on August 8.
The town’s mayor told the press after the cancellation that the event was canceled to “protect” officials who were verbally harassed by a dozen young men making “insistent threats” over the film.
French politicians condemn screening cancellation
Olivier Sarrabeyrouse claimed the men had threatened to smash equipment and had claimed Barbie was “promoting homosexuality” and “undermining the integrity of women.”
While also condemning right-wing politicians for feeding on the cultural debate, Sarrabeyrouse decried the group responsible as proponents of “obscurantism and fundamentalism.”
The screening has since been rescheduled after numerous requests by the town’s residents, the mayor said. However, Yoann Gillet, MP for Marine Le Pen’s National Rally, condemned the initial cancellation as “a serious mistake” amounting to “submitting to an Islamist ideology,” according to The Telegraph.
Bruno Retailleau, the interior minister and leader of the conservative Republicans, warned: “Below-the-radar Islamism is trying to infiltrate institutions, whose ultimate aim is to tip the whole of French society under sharia law.”
“The slightest retreat in the face of these community demands is unacceptable,” he told BFMTV.