Craig Zobel, director of controversial political thriller The Hunt, has spoken out about the film’s cancelled release claiming its plot and message have both been misrepresented.

Zobel, whose previous films include Compliance and Z for Zachariah, told Variety that despite anger from the right, his film doesn’t take a political stance. The thriller, starring Betty Gilpin and Hilary Swank, exists in an alternate America where liberal elites hunt working class “deplorables” for sport.

“Our ambition was to poke at both sides of the aisle equally,” he said. “We seek to entertain and unify, not enrage and divide. It is up to the viewers to decide what their takeaway will be.”

The Hunt was initially scheduled for a September release but was pulled by studio Universal after recent shootings in El Paso and Dayton. “Once inaccurate assumptions about the content and intent of the movie began to take hold, I supported the decision to move the film off its release date,” Zobel said.

The film had already been under fire from Fox News commentators and in turn Donald Trump who alluded to it as a project that was seeking “to inflame and cause chaos”.

“If I believed this film could incite violence, I wouldn’t have made it,” Zobel said. “I wanted to make a fun, action thriller that satirised this moment in our culture – where we jump to assume we know someone’s beliefs because of which ‘team’ we think they’re on … and then start shouting at them. This rush to judgment is one of the most relevant problems of our time.”

The film is produced by Jason Blum who has scored a number of genre hits in recent years including Get Out, The Purge franchise and the recent Halloween sequel. In an interview with Vulture, Blum said there’s “definitely a chance” of the film being released in the future.

Variety reports that an early draft of the script positioned the working class conservatives as heroes fighting back against the Democratic elites. A Universal spokesperson said that test screenings were very positive while no audience members expressed discomfort with the themes.