Washington, Oct 8: Most of the biggest theatre chains in the US have reportedly refused to screen the controversial film ‘Death of a President’, which depicts a fictional assassination of President George W. Bush.The R-rated film sparked controversy when it was premiered last month at the Toronto Film Festival, where it won the International Critics Prize and scored a U.S. distribution deal with Newmarket Films.
Mike Campbell, CEO of Regal Entertainment Group says that portrayal of the future assassination of a sitting President is a big turn off for them, as they don’t consider it to be an appropriate subject matter for a film.
"We would not be inclined to program this film. We feel it is inappropriate to portray the future assassination of a sitting President, regardless of political affiliation," E!online quoted him as telling Hollywood Reporter.
Set in 2007, after the passage of the so-called Patriot Act 3, Death of a President plays out like a typical TV documentary, but its writer-director Gabriel Range has used digitally blended archival footage of President Bush with staged scenes to depict his murder, and its aftermath.
The film focuses more on the FBI`s hunt for Bush`s killer, and whether a Syrian-born suspect is really the triggerman.
Bureau Report with ANI inputs