Featured Image Credit: Netflix
Topics: Netflix, News, Film and TV, Christmas
Niamh Shackleton
One of Netflix's new festive films has got people talking for all the wrong reasons.
Netflix has previously done pretty well with its Christmas movies - think The Christmas Chronicles and Klaus - however, one of its newest films hasn't received such high critical acclaim.
Starring Ed Helms and Jennifer Garner, the Family Switch is arguably a festive take on 2003's Freaky Friday.
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The movie's synopsis reads: “When family members switch bodies with each other during a rare planetary alignment, their hilarious journey to find their way back to normal will bring them closer together than they ever thought possible.”
While it's labelled as a comedy, there's one scene in particular that people haven't found very funny.
In the scene in question, the kids (CC and Wyatt) are trapped in their parents' bodies (Bill and Jess Walker), and they're made to kiss one another in front of their mum's pals after one of them claims that ‘couples need a minimum of 12 kisses a day just to sustain a relationship’.
And the scene has left people uncomfortable in light of the fact that the on-screen siblings had to kiss one another.
"The incest in Family Switch was NOT needed," one viewer fumed.
"The random incest in Family Switch caught me so off guard," added another.
Elsewhere, the moment was dubbed as 'low-hanging fruit' for comedy movies.
"Family Switch marks a real low point body-swap comedies as it steals from all others before it without compunction," penned another person on X.
"But you can thank your lucky stars they don’t go for the lowest hanging fruit: incest jokes. Just kidding. Those are there. I had you.”
Another person hit out at the movie being deemed 'family friendy' in light of the controversial moment.
They said: "Netflix’s movie Family Switch has implied incest. How did that advance the plot? And why would you put this in a holiday movie marketed as family friendly?"
Away from the 'incest' in the movie, The Family Switch had already divided viewers.
Screen Rant said of the film: “Family Switch yields some laughs, some cringe, and a fair amount of heart, even if it doesn't tread new ground for this ridiculous, beloved premise."
In contrast, The Hollywood Reporter penned: "It’s simply hard to feel all that deeply for characters so flat and sweet they might as well be gingerbread people, resolving problems that barely seemed to exist in the first place."
Maybe check out the film for yourself to make your own opinions...