The trailer for the film, starring Jamie Dornan and Dakota Johnson, was shown on US breakfast TV
By Rebecca Hawkes
25 Jul 2014
The Telegraph
The new trailer for Sam Taylor-Johnson’s Fifty Shades of Grey has angered viewers in the US after it was aired at 8am during NBC’s Today programme.
Watchdog group The Parents Television Council, an organisation which endeavours to to “promote family values”, has condemned NBC for showing the trailer for the film at a time when children would likely be watching.
“The Today show and Good Morning America and shows of that ilk. They’re on while you’re getting your morning situated. They’re on while you’re getting your kids situated for school or for camp … trying to get breakfast before you go off to work,” said PTC spokeperson Melissa Henson. “The fact that they’re romanticizing sexual violence in this way is also very troubling.”
The version of the trailer shown on the programme was in fact an edited one, which omitted several of the more suggestive scenes from the full-length trailer. An NBC spokesperson said: “We are always sensitive to the content we air on our program. The trailer that aired on Today this morning was a version edited with our audience in mind.”
Fifty Shades of Grey, which is based on the best-selling novel by EL James, details the relationship between a naive young student and a sexually experienced entrepreneur, and contains scenes depicting BDSM. Anti-porn education group Morality in Media have released a statement condemning the clip for how it allegedly “romanticises sexual violence.”
In a statement, the organisation’s director Dawn Hawkins said: “The implications of such a relationship — abuse of power, female inequality, coercion, and sexual violence — glamorises and legitimatises violence against women.”
Fifty Shades‘ distributor Universal Pictures and director Sam Taylor-Johnson are yet to respond to the allegations that the film is promoting sexual violence.
Fifty Shades of Grey will be released next year on February 14.
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