Barack and Michelle Obama blasted over movie they produced in which character warns against trusting 'white people'

Former President Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama are being blasted on social media over a new movie they produced in which a character warns against trusting "white people."

What are the details?

The scene is from Netflix's apocalyptic film "Leave the World Behind," which the Obamas co-produced through their Higher Ground company — an outfit that focuses on projects about race, class, democracy, and civil rights, Newsweek said.

The movie shows a mixed-race daughter telling her black father, "I'm asking you to remember that if the world falls apart, trust should not be doled out easily to anyone, especially white people — even mom would agree with me on that."

The deal is that a cyberattack has driven the world into chaos. A white family is renting a home on Long Island — and the father and daughter from the above scene show up to the house after a power outage in New York City, tell the white family they're the owners of the home they're renting, and ask if they can work out a deal to take refuge in the house as well.

The social commentary aspect is that Julia Roberts — who plays the wife and mother of the renters — comes across as racist for seeming surprised that black people could own such a stunning home.

It's not as though the Obamas weren't aware of the racism element or the scene in which the daughter tells her father that white people shouldn't be trusted too easily. In fact, Barack Obama gave notes to director Sam Esmail on his adapted screenplay, according to Vanity Fair.

“In the original drafts of the script, I definitely pushed things a lot farther than they were in the film, and President Obama, having the experience he does have, was able to ground me a little bit on how things might unfold in reality,” Esmail told the magazine. “I am writing what I think is fiction, for the most part, I’m trying to keep it as true to life as possible, but I’m exaggerating and dramatizing. And to hear an ex-president say you’re off by a few details. ... I thought I was off by a lot! The fact that he said that scared the f*** out of me.”

How have folks been reacting?

More than a few notable people are reacting negatively to the don't-trust-white-people scene — and the fact that the Obamas produced the film and knew about script details:

• "White people are the only group you’re allowed and celebrated to be racist towards, and it will be put into movies by the most influential people," Libs of TikTok noted.
• "This is unacceptable," conservative social media figure Liz Churchill wrote. "I would say the same thing if they said this about people of colour. How is this okay?"
• Podcaster Kyle Becker noted, "If you don’t support hatred against white people, then you’re a racist."
• "Imagine replacing 'white' with 'black,'" the Western Journal wrote. "All hell would break loose."

Others agreed:

• "They really produced it?" another commenter asked. "Dang, I watched it this week and yes, they portrayed the white characters as racist and dumb. I fell asleep at one point, and the ending was bad, too."
• "Of course they did," another commenter said. "Anything to divide the country."
• "They're not even hiding it anymore," another user declared.

The other side of the argument

But there's another perspective out there regarding the scene — taken in context with the movie as a whole. Journalist Brian Krassenstein took issue with all the Obama bashing and said that both families begin to trust each other and work together by the end of the movie.

"The whole moral of the story is to show how ridiculous our preconceived judgments of one another are, both white and black," Krassenstein wrote.

When an X user asked Krassenstein, "Can you imagine Trump and Melania producing a movie with the phrase 'especially black people' in it though. You have to see the double standard here, it’s so blatantly obvious."

But Krassenstein replied, "If the movie concluded the way this one did I would praise it."

Anything else?

Bloomberg on Tuesday reported that "Leave the World Behind" — which began streaming Friday — is Netflix’s No. 1 picture globally, sits at the top position in 85 countries, and is the Obamas' first "hit" film.

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