A new religious movie released on Netflix is facing backlash on social media. It isn’t always easy to release such projects, especially given how passionate people can be regarding their beliefs, but the reason for the following controversy is certainly surprising to see.
The film, titled Mary, revolves around the titular figure from the Bible. Mary, being the mother of Jesus, is a monumental part of religious history, and Netflix chose an Israeli cast to portray Mary and the other characters of the film. Noa Cohen plays Mary, and because of this, some social media users are becoming quite upset.
As mentioned, Cohen is an Israeli actress, and she’s joined by other Israeli actors like Ido Tako who plays Joseph. This is where some social media users are taking issue with the film, however, as they believe that Mary and Joseph should be portrayed as Palestinians.
Mary director D.J. Caruso previously stated that the decision to cast Israeli actors was to make sure the film’s portrayal of these religious figures included “authenticity.” As he stated while speaking with Entertainment Weekly in October:
“Instead of casting Middle-Eastern Christians to play the roles, the director casted European Israelis to play the roles for ‘authenticity’ reasons… yeah boycott this crap!”
As such, the complaints can be traced back for the last several months. Now that the film has been officially released, however, the complaints are just getting stronger. Here are some of the social media posts being made in response to the film and its controversies:
wdym netflix dropped a movie about mary (a historically jewish palestinian woman who tried to escape an oppresive system) and the cast is majority made of isr*eli actors.. pic.twitter.com/iiXrbLHWbF
— mar 🇵🇸 || #jinxisalive (@kirammanstrap) December 6, 2024
Wonder why they cast as Israeli Jew to play a Palestinian ? Mary is something I won’t watch.
— pjj (@wiggy1141) December 4, 2024
Cohen is an common Eastern European name.
A Israeli playing Mary, while Israelis commit Palestinian Genocide is unacceptable and insulting to Christians and Muslims.— Phoenix (@AktherShaien) November 29, 2024
As a Palestinian christian i hardly encourage you to not watch the new Netflix movie MARY . Mary is played by an israeli actress, DO NOT WATCH IT. Christians around the world please BOYCOTT THIS MOVIE!#Netflix #mary #jesusispalestinian again:JESUS WAS PALESTINAN🇵🇸✝️free Palestine
— TRS 🍉 PALESTINA LIBRE FREE PALESTINE (@baswalat) November 13, 2024
Ultimately, it looks like there isn’t any surefire way to make everyone happy when making these kinds of projects. Subscribers can now stream the religious movie Mary on Netflix. Stay tuned to ScreenGeek for any additional updates regarding the latest trending titles on the streaming platform and other such services, including the ones that might be sparking controversies online.