Sofia Carson and Elizabeth Allen Rosenbaum Defend Purple Hearts After Increasing Backlash

Purple Hearts is dominating the Netflix charts, having been watched more than 100 million hours despite only being on the streamer for two weeks.

The film, starring Sofia Carson and Nicholas Galitzine, centres around a liberal musician who marries a Marine in order to get health insurance.

However, even though the movie has been a huge success, it’s also been met with backlash about its misogynistic and racist themes.

For example, during one scene, a marine makes a toast and says, “This one is to life, love and hunting down some goddamn Arabs, baby!”

While Carson’s character Cassie calls him out, Galitizine’s Luke demands her to be quiet and sit down, implying that she’s overreacting.

While director Elizabeth Allen Rosenbaum has been on a high after reading the positive feedback, she’s also addressed the negativity surrounding the film.

“I hope that people understand that in order for characters to grow, they need to be flawed in the beginning. So we very much intentionally created two characters that had been bred to hate each other,” she told Variety. 

“They are flawed at the beginning, and that was intentional. In order for the red heart and the blue heart to kind of turn purple, you have to have them be kind of extreme. 

“Some of the people that they’re surrounded with are even more flawed than they are. They both have been neglected by the system; he’s hurt in a war that doesn’t seem to be ending and she’s slipping through the cracks of the healthcare system. 

“So they’re both neglected by the system, and then they live under one roof, and in these extreme circumstances, they learn to become more moderate and to listen to each other and to love.”

She went on to say that the US is “very flawed” at the moment, and she wanted to showcase that in the film.

“That was the biggest, most important part of the theme,” said Rosenbaum. “I do hope that anyone who’s in any way insulted by it understands that our intentions are very pure, and it’s because we feel like people need to grow and need to start to become more moderate.”

Carson, who is an executive producer on the movie, also weighed in, saying: “Why I fell in love with the movie is that it’s a love story, but it’s so much more than that.

“It’s two hearts, one red, one blue, two worlds apart, who are really raised to hate each other. Through the power of love, they learn to lead with empathy and compassion and love each other and turn into this beautiful shade of purple.

“We wanted to represent both sides as accurately as possible. What I think I’ve learned to do as an artist is separate myself from all of that and just listen to what the world is feeling and reacting to with the film.

“That has been so beautifully overwhelming, and so many people have felt seen or are comforted by this movie. That’s all we could want filmmakers and as artists.”

On the bright side, the movie has been praised for accurately portraying living with Type 1 Diabetes.

Rosenbaum and Carson worked with Dr. Michael Metzger and Laura Pavlakovich, the founder of the nonprofit You’re Just My Type, to make sure they got the details right.