The History Revealed YouTube channel has reacted to the Netflix documentary "Queen Cleopatra".
"Netflix and Jada Pinkett-Smith have made a highly controversial documentary about Cleopatra, they have claimed Cleopatra was black but what other liberties with history have they taken?" the video description says.
A recent documentary featured in the African Queens series delved into the captivating story of the final pharaoh of Egypt, chronicling both their ascension to power and eventual downfall. Despite being released on May 10, the documentary has garnered attention for its disappointing viewership numbers.
The documentary currently has a 2% audience rating on Rotten Tomatoes, which Forbes says is the lowest in history.
The “average Tomatometer” calculates how many critics rate it favourably, stands at 10%.
Here’s how bad that is: The worst film on the movie rating site, Ballistic: Ecks Vs Sever,” in 2002 has a 0% rating on the Tomatometer, but a 20% favourable rating by the audience. Another stinker, “One Missed Call” from 2008, also has a 0% Tomatometer but a 20% audience score.
And the Nicholas Cage bomb, “Left Behind,” from 2014 got 0% from the critics but 22% from the audience.
The publication said: 'Fans usually rate things higher than critics, even bad shows, and the point being, a 1 per cent audience score seems borderline mathematically impossible, even with the controversy the film has attracted.'
Producer Jada Pinkett Smith said she wanted to tell the story of Cleopatra because 'we don't often get to see or hear stories about black queens.'
In the trailer, which was released in April, claims that Cleopatra was black with 'curly hair.'
One historian asserts in the preview: 'I remember my grandmother saying to me: I don't care what they tell you in school, Cleopatra was black.'
An Egyptian lawyer has filed a case with the country's public prosecutor demanding that Netflix be shut down.
Cairo's former antiquities minister Zahi Hawass condemned the documentary as 'completely fake.'
They said: 'Cleopatra was Greek, meaning that she was light-skinned, not black.'
Zahi said the only rulers of Egypt known to have been black were the Kushite kings of the 25th Dynasty (747-656 BC).
He said: 'Netflix is trying to provoke confusion by spreading false and deceptive facts that the origin of the Egyptian civilization is black.'
In April, Mahmoud al-Semary filed a complaint with the public prosecutor demanding that he take 'the necessary legal measures' to block access to Netflix.
He alleged the show featured content that violated Egypt's media laws and accused Netflix of trying to 'promote the Afrocentric thinking ... which includes slogans and writings aimed at distorting and erasing the Egyptian identity.'
READ MORE: Egypt to make its own documentary on Queen Cleopatra in response to Netflix's historical revisionism.
