The new Britney Spears documentary has sparked a Twitterstorm of comments, with more than a million people weighing in on what they saw when the film debuted over the weekend.
The New York Times Presents: Framing Britney Spears appeared on TV in America late on Friday night, and fans were appalled by what they watched, turning to Twitter to vent their frustration.
More than 220,000 tweets used the now-popular #FreeBritney hashtag, referencing the movement set up last year aimed at helping the troubled popstar escape the people fans fear are controlling her life.
The documentary studied the conservatorship in charge of Spears' estate.
The online responses spiked on Tuesday when Britney's boyfriend, Sam Asghari, spoke out about the singer's ongoing situation and took aim at her father, Jamie Spears, who controls the singer's finances and welfare.
Celebrities like Kacey Musgraves, Hayley Williams, and Sarah Jessica Parker are among those who have taken to Twitter to speak out about the documentary and send their support to 39-year-old Spears.
Paramore star Williams' note was one of the most retweeted. It read: "the Framing Britney Spears doc holy f**k. no artist today would have to endure the literal torture that media/society/utter misogynists inflicted upon her. the mental health awareness conversation, culturally, could never be where it is without the awful price she has paid."
The New York Times film features interviews with blogger Perez Hilton, who boasts that when Britney does badly, he does well, and the singer's ex-boyfriend Justin Timberlake, while her father, Jamie, is painted as a terrible, toxic force. But perhaps the most awkward footage is a hard-hitting 2003 TV interview, in which newswoman Diane Sawyer grills the singer and visibly upsets her by quoting Maryland's then-First Lady Kendel Ehrlich who famously said she'd like to shoot Spears if she got the chance, due to the bad example the popstar was allegedly setting for American kids.
