Some are boycotting the flick saying it's a twisted 'transgender trope that is being forced down our throat'

The film has also been called 'a strong contender for 2016's worst movie'

Rodriguez said she would never do a 'with the intention of offending anybody in the LGBT community'

criticism from transgender community who said the medical procedure should not be used as a sensationalistic plot device

The movie is about a hitman who undergoes sexual reassignment surgery

The director and stars of a film about a hitman who becomes a hitwoman after an evil doctor gives her gender reassignment surgery have defended the movie.

'(re)Assignment', which stars Michelle Rodriguez as an assassin named Frank Kitchen, had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival on Wednesday.

After killing the brother of a brilliant but deranged surgeon, Kitchen is double crossed by gangsters and falls into the hands of the surgeon known as The Doctor who then turns him into a woman.

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'(re)Assignment', which stars Michelle Rodriguez (right) and Sigourney Weaver (left) defended the movie along with director Walter Hill (center) against criticism from some in the transgender community

Rodriguez stars as an assassin named Frank Kitchen (pictured) in the movie that had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival on Wednesday. Kitchen is double-crossed by gangsters in the movie and falls into the hands of a deranged surgeon

Weaver stars in the movie, which has been called 'transphobic', as the insane but brilliant doctor

The premise drew criticism from some in the transgender community, who said the medical procedure should not be used as a sensationalistic plot device.

It was also called transphobic and exploitative by Twitter users.

The film's challenges have not stopped there.

Some early reviews have been very negative, with the Guardian newspaper calling it 'a strong contender for 2016's worst movie'.

Kitchen (played by Rodriguez) is then forcibly turned into a woman

The newspaper said the film is 'made with such staggering idiocy that it deserves to be studied by future generations for just how and why it ever got made'.

And Variety branded some of the lines 'dismal' and said the film was poorly executed, stating: '(The) flat air allows no sense of ironic distance to leaven some laughably clunky dialogue, which defies two lead thesps who might have made something even of this preposterous concept if they'd been given a more deft, layered script.'

Entertainment site Vulture was equally scathing, describing the film as 'a mess' and concluding: 'Trans people have already begun protesting the film on Twitter, and I suspect they'll soon be joined by fans of good cinema.'

And Consequence of Sound was unimpressed too, stating: 'Once the giddy critical pile-on and hate-watching settles down, the (justified) moral outrage that re(Assignment) tries to thwart will end up being the regrettable and forgettable film’s only lasting legacy.'

Transgender activist Elizabeth Marie Rivera said the crime thriller contains 'a f**ked up and twisted "transgender" trope that is being forced down our throat'.

Rodriguez said she would 'never do a movie with the intention of offending anybody in the LGBT community because I'm a part of it'

Rivera posted a photo of Rodriguez as the character Frank Kitchen to Instagram calling for a boycott of the movie.

Director Walter Hill, who made action classics '48 Hours' and 'The Warriors', noted at the premiere that other filmmakers had dealt with 'altering biological organs'.

'I don't know why this one stirred up such interest in a way that those didn't, except that I think the transgender situation has been more in the headlines the last couple of years,' he said in a red carpet interview.

'I don't know. I'm a storyteller, it's a crime story, it's a noir vision, it's comic book in a way and quite a few women have said to me that after seeing the movie, they feel empowered by it.'

Sigourney Weaver, who plays the deranged doctor, said 'certainly no-one is demeaned or denigrated', adding: 'It's not a Disney movie. It is noir'

Rodriguez, who starred in the 'Fast and the Furious' series, took issue with criticism, asking: 'Are they mad that somebody decided to take their branded transgender operation and use it on heterosexual people?'

She also noted the film was a 'B-movie noir genre comic book take on something' and that she herself was part of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community.

'I'm bisexual. I do guys. I do girls. You can't really argue with me because I'm you. So if I do a movie, I'd never do a movie with the intention of offending anybody in the LGBT community because I'm a part of it,' she said.