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Over the last few days, a lot of the discourse surrounding Christopher Nolans latest has been about Oppenheimers box office and other internet momentum surrounding the Barbenheimer double feature phenomenon. But theres another discourse going around online about the movie, and it has to do with Florence Pughs nude scenes.

The actress has been a huge advocate of body positivity even before choosing to go nude in order to play Jean Tatlock in Nolans latest historical epic, but her scenes in the movie, which do feature lovemaking and intimate moments where the two characters have candid conversations while undressed, have faced backlash and even censorship in some countries.

In the movie, Pugh plays Jean Tatlock, a woman whom J. Robert Oppenheimer was intimately involved with before his marriage. the two met at the University of California Berkeley, where shed been taking courses toward her psychology degree and the scientist was in his thirties and on the faculty. Oppenheimer reportedly proposed to her more than once while they were dating, but the situation didnt work out.

As portrayed in the timeline of Christopher Nolans Oppenheimer, he was allegedly Jeans rock in times of emotional turmoil, but after he married Kitty Puening, she became more of an occasional mistress. In the movie, it is shown the two had one final meeting as the Manhattan Project was amping up at Los Alamos (and historical records confirm the real-life man visited her up until 1943). In the film, he said he needed to cut back on contact. She subsequently died by suicide in 1944.

Pugh's part in the movie is a small one, but it has made a large impact.

Pugh has been candid about being asked to lose weight for roles in the past, but she has not spoken out about people commenting on her body in the movie. However, Cillian Murphy was asked about filming the emotionally raw moments with the actress. He told the Sydney Morning Herald that the scenes where Pugh chose to go topless landed the movie its R-rating (for sexuality, nudity and language), but that they made so much sense in context.

Those scenes were written deliberately. He knew that those scenes would get the movie the rating that it got. And I think when you see it, its so fucking powerful. And theyre not gratuitous. Theyre perfect. And Florence is just amazing.

After the movie premiered, a lot of discourse has surrounded these scenes. On TikTok, various videos have dissected and upacked the nudity. Elsewhere, on Twitter some people have made critical comments about Florence Pughs body appearing in the movie unclothed. Other tweets have defended the actress, but its clear the topic has become a point of conversation thats spiraled a bit out of proportion.

This isnt the first time the actress has faced backlash for her body. Last year, she chose to wear a sheer Valentino dress that subsequently went viral because she freed the nipple. While the moment will likely live for a long time in fashion history, it prompted a lot of Internet comments. Pugh later responded to the Valentino backlash, noting:

I was comfortable with my small breasts. And showing them like thatit aggravated [people] that I was comfortable.

The comment from the actress was about the pink dress she wore to the fashion show, but it would be applicable in this situation as well. Yet the conversation around the nude scenes has only grown after varying countries began censoring it.

In some countries, Florence Pughs nude scenes dont exist at all. Instead, CGI was used to cover her up in a black slip in countries like India. Theatergoers in other locations, including Bangladesh and Indonesia, also reported attending Oppenheimer screenings in which the character of Jean Tatlock was fully clothed thanks to a slip that was created to appeal to the censors in those countries.

This strategy has allowed the movie to retain ratings closer to PG-13 (or whatever the countrys rating equivalent is, U/A in India, for example) rather than the R-rating the movie received in the U.S, and it has allowed the film to screen in certain countries with higher cultural sensitivities.

But between this and the online discourse, Pughs body has taken front and center in the Oppenheimer conversation, when really its her performance that should be highlighted. In fact, a lot of performances from the Oppenheimer cast should be highlighted, from Emily Blunt's quiet struggles and inner determination and strength, to Robert Downey Jr. chewing up scenes, to Cillian Murphy's deliberate and haunted presence. It's a movie that will stick with you for long after viewing, and there are a lot of themes and philosophical conversations that are more interesting to talk about.

This backlash is just the sideshow.

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Florence Pugh's Oppenheimer Nude Scenes: The R-Rating, The ... - CinemaBlend

A judge on Tuesday prohibited several federal agencies and officials of the Biden administration from working with social media companies about "protected speech," a decision called "a blow to censorship" by one of the Republican officials whose lawsuit prompted the ruling, the AP reports. US District Judge Terry Doughty of Louisiana granted the injunction in response to a 2022 lawsuit brought by attorneys general in Louisiana and Missouri. Their lawsuit alleged that the federal government overstepped in its efforts to convince social media companies to address postings that could result in vaccine hesitancy during the COVID-19 pandemic or affect elections. (Doughty's injunction allows several exceptions, such as informing social media companies of postings involving criminal activity, conspiracies, or threats.)

Doughty cited "substantial evidence" of a far-reaching censorship campaign. He wrote that the "evidence produced thus far depicts an almost dystopian scenario. During the COVID-19 pandemic, a period perhaps best characterized by widespread doubt and uncertainty, the United States Government seems to have assumed a role similar to an Orwellian 'Ministry of Truth.' " Republican US Sen. Eric Schmitt, who was the Missouri attorney general when the lawsuit was filed, said on Twitter that the ruling was "a huge win for the First Amendment and a blow to censorship." Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry said the injunction prevents the administration "from censoring the core political speech of ordinary Americans" on social media.

The lawsuit accused the administration of using the possibility of favorable or unfavorable regulatory action to coerce social media platforms to squelch what it considered misinformation. The Justice Department is reviewing the injunction "and will evaluate its options in this case," said a White House official who was not authorized to discuss the case publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity. "This administration has promoted responsible actions to protect public health, safety, and security when confronted by challenges like a deadly pandemic and foreign attacks on our elections," the official said. "Our consistent view remains that social media platforms have a critical responsibility to take account of the effects their platforms are having on the American people, but make independent choices about the information they present."

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Judge Delivers What Republicans Say Is a 'Blow to Censorship' - Newser

The Pentagon updated its rules for working with filmmakers after Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) inserted language into the fiscal 2023 defense policy bill. Cruz has pushed back on Beijings censorship of films.

What does it say to the world when Maverick is scared of the Chinese communists? he said in a floor speech at the time.

According to a new Defense Department document obtained by POLITICO, filmmakers who want the U.S. military to help with their projects must now pledge that they wont let Beijing alter those films.

The DOD will not provide production assistance when there is demonstrable evidence that the production has complied or is likely to comply with a demand from the Government of the Peoples Republic of China to censor the content of the project in a material manner to advance the national interest of the Peoples Republic of China, the document reads.

Hollywood and the Defense Department have enjoyed a symbiotic relationship for decades. The Pentagon has allowed filmmakers to shoot their projects on military bases, Navy ships, or other locations, and weighs in on filmmaking processes. The military benefits from positive portrayals of service members, and moviemakers benefit from authentic settings and technical expertise.

But as Chinas ruling Communist Party has developed increasingly advanced censorship and surveillance tools, countless American companies including Hollywood studios have sought to comply with Beijings demands while attempting to dodge stateside pushback.

Chinese government censors can be unpredictable and demanding. They pushed the producers of Spider-man: No Way Home to remove the Statue of Liberty, according to Puck. And they wanted the filmmakers of Lightyear to cut a short same-sex kiss, according to CNN. Neither of the studios complied, and neither film was released in mainland China.

In its new rule, the department will also weigh any verifiable information from people who arent connected to the production who indicate that the film could comply with a censorship demand.

Once DOD greenlights cooperation on a project, the agency assigns an officer to work with the filmmakers. From now on, the production company must notify that person in writing of such a censorship demand, including the terms of such demand, and whether the project has complied or is likely to comply with a demand for such censorship.

Cruz said he was pleased with the new rule.

The Chinese Communist Party spends billions on propaganda and censorship, he said. For years Hollywood helped them by censoring movies so they could be screened in China, while still working with the U.S. government to get those very same movies developed.

This new guidance implementing the legislation I authored in the SCRIPT Act will force studios to choose one or the other, and Im cautiously optimistic that theyll make the right choice and reject Chinas blackmailing.

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Pentagon to filmmakers: We won't help you if you kowtow To China - POLITICO

Last year, Twitter sued India over orders to block content within the country, saying the government had applied its 2021 IT laws "arbitrarily and disproportionately." Now, India's Karnataka High Court has dismissed the plea, with a judge saying Twitter had failed to explain why it delayed complying with the new laws in the first place, TechCrunch has reported. The court also imposed a 5 million rupee ($61,000 fine) on the Elon Musk-owned firm.

"Your client (Twitter) was given notices and your client did not comply. Punishment for non-compliance is seven years imprisonment and unlimited fine. That also did not deter your client," the judge told Twitter's legal representation. "So you have not given any reason why you delayed compliance, more than a year of delay then all of sudden you comply and approach the Court. You are not a farmer but a billon dollar company."

Twitters relationship with India was fraught for much of 2021. In February, the government threatened to jail Twitter employees unless the company removed content related to protests by farmers held that year. Shortly after that, India ordered Twitter to pull tweets criticizing the countrys response to the COVID-19 pandemic. More recently, the government ordered Twitter to block tweets from Freedom House, a nonprofit organization that claimed India was an example of a country where freedom of the press is on the decline.

Those incidents put Twitter in a compromising situation. It either had to comply with government orders to block content (and face censorship criticism inside and outside the country), or ignore them and risk losing its legal immunity. In August, it complied with the orders and took down content as ordered.

The court order follows recent comments from Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, saying that India threatened to raid employees homes if it didn't comply with orders to remove posts and accounts. In a tweet, India's deputy minister for information technique called that "an outright lie" saying Twitter was "in non-compliance with the law."

Twitter filed the suit around the same time that Elon Musk started trying to wiggle out of buying Twitter. Since then, Twitter has often complied with government takedown requests most recently in Turkey, where it limited access to some tweets ahead of a tightly contested election won by incumbent president Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

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Twitter's lawsuit over censorship in India has been dismissed - Engadget

The Barbie movie was meant to be for everyone. If you love Barbie, this movie is for you, the trailer for Warner Bros. summer blockbuster declares. If you hate Barbie, this movie is for you.

But with just weeks before the star-studded film about the titular doll was set to hit theaters, some in Southeast Asia have decided that its not for them.

It was announced in Vietnam on Monday that the cinematic distribution of Barbie would be banned over the display of a map that includes the nine-dash line, a disputed maritime border that China has controversially used to lay claim to virtually all of the South China Sea, even though it was rejected in 2016 by an international tribunal.

Authorities in the Philippines, also troubled by the promotion of the nine-dash line, are currently deliberating whether or not to permit the release of the film. The movie is fiction, and so is the nine-dash line. At the minimum, our cinemas should include an explicit disclaimer that the nine-dash line is a figment of Chinas imagination, Philippine Senator Risa Hontiveros said Tuesday.

Photograph by Carlota Guerrero for TIME

Read More: How Barbie Came to Life

The context of the alleged depiction of the nine-dash line in the new Barbie movie is unclear. But its not the first time this kind of censorship has occurred over similar concerns.

Last year, the Philippines and Vietnam both banned screenings of Sonys action-adventure flick Uncharted because of a brief scene depicting the contentious nine-dash line. And in 2019, both the Philippines and Malaysiaanother country that contests Chinas territorial claims to the waterwaystopped the domestic distribution of the DreamWorks animated movie Abominable after producers declined a request to remove a scene showing the nine-dash line. (In Vietnam, Abominable had already been out in cinemas for more than a week before censors pulled it and fined the films distributor.) In 2018, a second-long clip, which featured a designer handbag with a map that showed the South China Seas islands under Chinas control, was cut from Crazy Rich Asians screenings in Vietnam.

Its not just the big screen thats under scrutiny. In 2021, officials in the Philippines ordered Netflix to take down select episodes of Australian spy drama Pine Gap due to scenes containing the nine-dash line, while Vietnam demanded the entire series be removed from the streamer.

The repeated instances of the same issue raise questions about Hollywoods relationship with China, which commands a 1.4 billion-person market. China has been critical to the global box office success of many contemporary films, and studios have been known to try to appease Beijings own stringent censors in an effort to not be shut out.

Recently, however, Hollywood studios, facing pushback for their acquiescence, have started to stand up to China. The trailer from Tom Cruises 2022 movie Top Gun: Maverick initially removed Taiwanese and Japanese flags to placate China, but following a public backlash, the flags reappeared in the film.

A U.S. Defense Department memo obtained by POLITICO last week said that filmmakers wont receive support from the Pentagonwhich typically assists on movies and shows that portray the military or require filming on basesif they alter their productions to comply with Chinese censorship demands.

The growing resistance from Southeast Asian states to even blink-and-youll-miss-it flashes of subtle political propaganda in popular culture demonstrates a heightened vigilance against Chinese influence, says Richard Heydarian, a political analyst and senior lecturer in Asian affairs at the University of the Philippines. Outright bans come at a price: viewers excited to see much anticipated Hollywood blockbusters miss out, and it thrusts the censoring countries into the spotlight for what Heydarian says could be perceived as petty oversensitivity.

But getting attention is the point. Sunlight is the best disinfectant, Heydarian says. Vietnam is reminding the world that Chinese state propaganda should have no place in supposedly innocuous productions like Barbie movies. It just doesnt make sense.

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Vietnam Bans Barbie: What to Know About Hollywoods Nine-Dash ... - TIME