Hundreds of people are questioning the controversial cast of Exodus: God and Kings calling the movie racist.

Even though “Exodus: Gods and Kings” doesn’t hit theaters until December, it is already labeled one of the year’s most controversial films. This is because the director Ridley Scott has cast white actors to play Egyptians in the Biblical film, while non-white actors are only given roles as slaves, servants and thieves. For example, Christian Bale plays Moses, Sigourney Weaver plays Tuya and Aaron Paul plays Joshua in the upcoming feature film.

“Ridley Scott is one of those guys who’s apparently hellbent on historical accuracy but doesn’t care enough to cast a person of color as Moses or a goddamn African queen while simultaneously filling out the rest of the movie with Black servants and thieves,” David Dennis Jr. wrote in a widely circulated post on Medium titled “You Probably Shouldn’t Go See Ridley Scott’s Pretty Racist ‘Exodus’ Movie.” “But to make the main characters white and everyone else African is cinematic colonialism. It’s creating a piece of historical ‘art’ that carries on oppressive imagery that’s helped shackle entire countries and corners of the world.”

After the first trailer premiered and dozens of people vowed to boycott the movie. Hundreds of people took to Twitter posting #BoycottExodusMovie  Joel Edgerton, who plays Ramses in the movie, told The Guardian that he understood the complaints and concerns.

“[It was] not my job to make those decisions,” he said of the casting process. “I got asked to do a job and it would have been very hard to say no to that job. [But] I do say that I am sensitive to it and I do understand and empathize with that position.”

In an interview with with Yahoo!, Scott has addressed the casting of “Exodus: Gods and Kings,” though he was not asked directly about allegedly whitewashing the story. Here’s his answer:

I guess being a director, in some ways, is like being the captain of a sports team, like a soccer team, and you have to make sure that you have every position covered really well because that will help you to win the game. So I always look on making a film as a partnership and that’s what casting is all about, whether it’s the star or the guy with one line. And by doing that you enable them to feel confident to try things out and feel free to suggest things. And over the years I’ve got the best results from actors who really are my partners in the process and it makes it all the more enjoyable. In this instance I’d met Christian four or five years ago when we had a cup of tea together and a rich tea biscuit in LA and he said, ‘What are we going to do together?’ And I said “well, I’ll come up with something.’ And it wasn’t until five years later when I was thinking about the idea of Exodus and Moses being this kind of larger than life character who, at the same time, has to be played definitively as a very real person, that I thought of Christian and I knew he was the right actor for the role. It’s not a fantasy. Ramses certainly wasn’t a fantasy and somewhere Moses is very much written down and indicated and believed. So it’s a real thing.

Ridley Scott was then asked about the film’s “international cast”:

Egypt was –- as it is now -– a confluence of cultures, as a result of being a crossroads geographically between Africa, the Middle East and Europe. We cast major actors from different ethnicities to reflect this diversity of culture, from Iranians to Spaniards to Arabs. There are many different theories about the ethnicity of the Egyptian people, and we had a lot of discussions about how to best represent the culture.

Scott does not directly confront the issue. But, Rupert Murdoch took to Twitter sparking a fire. Rupert Murdoch, owner of News Corp and 21st Century Fox, tweeted early yesterday:

Moses film attacked on Twitter for all white cast. Since when are Egyptians not white? All I know are.

— Rupert Murdoch (@rupertmurdoch) November 29, 2014

People responded to Murdoch’s comments by calling the CEO of the world’s media “a rather ill-informed moron”. Another tweeter, @scifisunsets, responded with “Jesus Rupe, all that money and you know hee-haw about people.” Raymond Delauney tweeted: “All… Egyptian dictators you’ve supported are no doubt ‘white’.” Fifteen minutes after his first comment, Rupert Murdoch retaliated:

Everybody-attacks last tweet. Of course Egyptians are Middle Eastern, but far from black. They treated blacks as slaves. — Rupert Murdoch (@rupertmurdoch) November 29, 2014

Okay, there are many shades of color. Nothing racist about that, so calm down!

— Rupert Murdoch (@rupertmurdoch) November 29, 2014

Some secondary characters in the movie are being played by ethnic minority actors, including Golshifteh Farahani and Indira Varma.
Ridley Scott tried and failed to defend Exodus from critics by arguing that it would have been impossible to finance the movie had the lead actor been “Mohammad so-and-so from such-and-such”.

Exodus: Gods and Kings centers around (Christian Bale) Moses as he rises up against the Egyptian Pharaoh Ramses (Joel Edgerton), setting 600,000 slaves on a journey of escape from Egypt and its terrifying cycle of deadly plagues.

The Hollywood Diversity Report published earlier this year revealed only 11 percent of all films cast an ethnic minority actor in a lead roles, while ethnic minority actors made up just 10 percent of the cast in a majority of movies.

What do you think? Do you think Exodus is a racist movie? Discuss this story with fellow Project Casting fans on Facebook. On Twitter, follow us at @projectcasting.

This is the world’s youngest supermodel, Kristina Pimenova

Nine-year-old Kristina Pimenova of Moscow, Russia, has been modeling since the age of three and is called the “the most beautiful girl in the world.” Pimenova, who is also a youth gymnast has already modeled for major fashion designers such as, Roberto Cavalli, Dolce & Gabbana, Armani, and Benetton. Some people are even calling her the youngest supermodel.

Her mother Gilkeriya Shirokova, a former model, managers her daughter’s career and several social media accounts. She regularly updates Kristina’s Instagram feed with photos of her both professional and candid, and argues that Kristina ‘DOES NOT post on the Internet.’

The nine-year-old’s Facebook biography reads: ‘She first got started in modelling when she was 3 years old, anywhere her mom would go, people would tell her how adorable Kristina was and tell her to try modelling.

‘Her mom decided to try it out and Kristie soon realized how much fun it was, especially catwalk and fashion shows.

‘She’s been having a blast ever since and is still loving every minute of it.’

Kristina Pimenova has more than two million Facebook followers, but also a large group of concerned parents who insist she is being sexualized. Recent comments on her Instagram photos include users calling her a “babe” and praising her “long legs.”

Despite only modeling children’s clothing and wearing little, if any make-up in her professional shots, photos include her wearing shorts or little skirts often which invite tons of disturbing comments.

“Creepy pic for a child,” one commenter of a candid photo of Kristina wearing leopard print hot pants, while another male user writes: “I like it.”

This is what other commenters had to say:

In response to one comment about Kristina’s ‘sexy legs’, another wrote: ‘Treating a child like a adult, taking adult style photos is so wrong.

‘You are sexifying your daughter and parents like you are the reason why girls grow up to have many issues… also there are so many sick ppl out their that look at these in sexually ways.

‘My child would never ever ever ever ever wear shorts this tight and small ever [sic].’ [via]

Some people argue that Kristina’s photos are entirely innocent and that adults are projecting their own agendas onto neutral images. But, is all that social media feedback necessary for a 9 year old. As Stacey Ritzen from Uproxx pointed out:

Not to sound all Judgey McJudgerson, but I don’t know what the hell putting photos of your child online to be ogled at by grown adults has anything to do with your kid’s modeling career. Pimenova’s mother claims that she removes any inappropriate comments on her daughter’s images, but should they even there to be commented in the first place? As Mark Shrayber over at Jezebel notes, the attention — both positive and negative —  is likely to wreak havoc on a child’s psyche. [via]

What do you think of Kristina Pimenova? Discuss this story with fellow Project Casting fans on Facebook. On Twitter, follow us at @projectcasting.