Cuties

Going in, I was sure that I would hate this movie especially given the way the girls were portrayed on that initial Netflix poster. But I decided to give it a chance as I always tend to prefer to decide things for myself.

Starting off, I think it’s would be criminal not to praise the the five main actresses in the movie, Fathia Youssouf, Médina El Aidi-Azouni, Esther Gohourou, Ilanah Cami-Goursolas and Maïmouna Gueye. I don’t know many 11 year olds who can portray a story as well as they did on screen. Despite the controversy, I think these girls deserve a lot of recognition for their hard work and obvious acting talents.

Cuties is about Amy, who is 11 year old Senegalese girl who lives with her mother and two younger brothers. Because she’s the oldest and a female, she takes on much of the responsibility of taking care of her siblings, as her dad is away. Amy has been forced into the role of an adult sitting with the adults, cooking, baby sitting, feeding her brothers etc.

Understandably, she rebels. Instead of accepting the responsibilities that have been placed on her, like her mom is forced to, she focuses her attention on something that directly opposes her family values. She develops a morbid curiosity for the popular girls in her school who have a dance group, Cuties. However, despite having the responsibilities of a woman, the kids at her school still call them little girls when they try to dance with the older kids.

Amy, being dedicated to escaping her family norms and more focused on proving herself, tries to prove that she is indeed, a woman, despite not knowing what a woman is, really.

The Cuties begin dancing in flirtatious ways, twerking and grinding like adults, all under the instruction of Amy. They dance in overtly sexual ways, not for sexual attention, but for popularity - to prove their maturity. They don’t really understand what they’re doing as they bite their lips and bat their eyelashes. It’s made even more clear when one girl finds and blows up a condom, thinking it’s a balloon. They use soap on a toothbrush to ‘scrub off the aids’ that she must have caught.

These are kids. The movie keeps reminding us. They don’t know what they’re doing. The idea of sex is really far away from them.

Despite obviously being kids, they just want to be treated like adults, which reminds me of every child I’ve ever met (and myself ). They begin getting more adult with their dancing, batting their eyes and pouting - they have no idea what that means to the men watching. It all comes to a climax on stage, when Amy sees the looks the men are giving them and the way the women look away and try to get their kids to do the same.

Honestly this part of the movies was uncomfortable to watch. It made me feel gross. Young girls shouldn’t be doing these dances, I thought, and on stage? This can’t happen!

And then I remembered.

That's literally the world right now.

The people mad at this movie have completely missed the point of it. How can we be mad at the director, Doucouré, for pointing a finger at the world we live in? This is filmmaking. The reality is, her movie was an accurate depiction of how the world sexualises children - and it's disgusting.

The outrage that Cuties has caused is fair, but it’s being pointed in the wrong direction. In my opinion, the persons annoyed at this movie for making the point, are the ones who don’t know what children do now-a-days.

With summer coming to an end, I thought it a good idea to have a picnic earlier this week. As I lounged and read, I was disturbed by a group of 11-12 year old girls running around, screaming and just doing annoying things little girls do. I ignored it, but soon heard a familiar tune. The girls were taking turns doing the WAP dance and recording each other. They used the clean lyrics, but the moves were still not appropriate for children - even as they happily cheered each other on and playfully corrected each other when they got the moves wrong. I had to look around because some part of me felt the need to protect these children from onlookers. Regardless of that, they were recording, so it must have ended up online somewhere.

I couldn’t help but wonder what would have happened if those girls had seen Cuties. Maybe they would have learned from Amy’s arc.Pretending the issue isn’t there will never be good enough stop it from happening. This movie, told the story that needed to be told right now.

Anyone who has been paying attention would have been able to see how the world we live in pressures young girls to be more and more overtly s*xual for the attention of their peers. Those girls I saw yesterday felt the same pressures Amy faced in Cuties, but they were in the real world.

I wish we could blame TLC, or Cardi B, but the truth is kids unfortunately have to internalise the things adults pass onto them. In the adult world, sex sells. When adults are overtly sexual in dances and they become popular, kids want to do it too, just to impress their friends! They don’t understand why the moves are adult.

Even if this movie was never created, there would still be TikTok, Instagram Live…Twitter…etc. Children have their own audiences and their own platforms, because of the world we’ve created for them. They’re making the same mistakes Amy did, right now! I saw those girls making the Wap video just yesterday! It’s beyond the point where adults can decide to stop it. Even if we really want to, no adult can force their child to do anything, really - they'll just do it when their parent aren't around. We need to show them why it’s not good. You don’t order - you teach.

I can’t help thinking that if those children had seen Cuties, they would have been able to learn something from Amy. Calling Cuties a movie for pedophiles is grossly unethical, and it ignores the truth that so so much of our culture today displays the same imagery. At least Cuties made an attempt at critiquing the actions!

The truth is, even if the movie is cancelled, the WAP challenge will still be there and feeds will still be open to receive videos from ignorant children who don’t understand what they’re doing. We just need our kids to understand why it’s not okay, and movies like Cuties is one way educate them.