The director of Much Loved, a controversial new Moroccan film, has been summoned to court on charges of “pornography, indecency and inciting minors to debauchery”.

Moroccan media reports say director Nabil Ayouch and his Moroccan leading actor, Loubna Abidar, who plays a prostitute in the film, are to appear in court in Marrakesh on 15 July.

The film immediately became the centre of a social media backlash in Moroccoafter several clips including explicit sex leaked online following the film’s screening at Cannes last month. Among the responses was a Facebook page that called for the execution of the French-Moroccan director and his lead actor.

The Moroccan government have banned the film in advance of its planned autumn release. Minister of communication Mustapha El Khalfi said that “it undermines the moral values and dignity of Moroccan women, and is a flagrant attack on the Kingdom’s image”. Representatives from the government are yet to see the film.

Not everyone in Morocco agrees with the minister. “Artistic works must be evaluated according to creative criteria and not through a moral prism,” said Khadija Rouissi, an opposition MP and deputy speaker of the parliament.

Ayouch, who is no stranger to controversy in his native land, said he was “very shocked and surprised” by the ban, arguing that “it’s healthy for a country to be able to look at itself in the mirror”. The director has reportedly defied the ban by screening the film at a private university in the Moroccan capital, Rabat, where he defended his film and thanked the people who published clips on social media. “They offered me free publicity,” he was reported as saying at the private screening, adding that “it was inappropriate to ban the film”.

Much Loved, also known as Zin Li Fik in Morocco, tells the story of four women working as prostitutes in Morocco’s most popular tourist destination, Marrakesh. Denied state funding, Ayouch and his team cast non-professional actors from the neighbourhoods where prostitution is common in Morocco. The film was made by a largely female team.

The film presents realistic sex, including a fumble in a parked van, a failed attempt to achieve an erection (resulting in violence) and scenes of violent sex. Later, a Moroccan policeman rapes the lead character while she is in custody, and a French tourist shouts, “We’re going to get fucked tonight!”. One scene shows a homeless boy admitting that European men are regularly abusing him for sex at £5 a time.

Morocco is a Muslim country where prostitution is illegal, even though many analysts say sex work not only constitutes a thriving industry, but is some people’s only way of making a living. There is concern among analysts that the country’s lax regulation is providing a safe haven for sex tourists, particularly paedophiles, drawn by the low conviction rates for those caught soliciting sex.