"Fahrenheit 9/11" gets industry "thumbs up"
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taken from
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/040609/325/evjjh.html
By Arthur Spiegelman
Director Michael Moore's controversial anti-Iraq war film "Fahrenheit 9/11" has won a standing ovation from an audience of film industry professionals attending its West Coast debut at Academy Award headquarters.
After an audience of more than 600 people in the theatre of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences cheered, whistled and laughed their way through the two-hour film on Tuesday night, they jumped to their feet to give Moore a standing ovation as he took the stage.
Clearly buoyed by the reception, Moore, whose film is scathingly critical and mocking of President George W. Bush, declared: "There has been a shift in this country. ... The average American is finally beginning to figure it out. We were duped (into invading Iraq)."
"I hope this country will be back in our hands in a short period of time," he added.
Republicans have denounced the film as unfair.
"Fahrenheit 9/11," with its strong attack on a U.S. president who is highly unpopular in Europe, won the top prize at the recent Cannes Film Festival, but it was refused distribution by the Walt Disney, whose Miramax film unit made the movie.
Disney chief Michael Eisner said the company did not want to distribute a highly partisan film in the middle of a presidential election year. He sold the rights to the film back to Miramax heads Bob and Harvey Weinstein, who formed a consortium to distribute the film and have it in theatres on June 25.
The dispute led to a spate of stories of bad blood between the embattled Eisner and the Weinsteins, including a recent one in The New York Times that speculated that Eisner was seeking a buyer for the prestigious Miramax unit.
Weinstein alluded to that controversy when he introduced the film and joked that he and his brother were taking out a classified ad saying: "Two executives looking for company to run. Resumes on request." He added, "If any of you know anything, we will be outside waiting."
Moore won an Academy Award for his 2002 documentary, "Bowling for Columbine," about the Columbine High School massacre in Colorado and the ease with which one can buy a gun in the United States.
In his remarks on Tuesday, Moore predicted "Fahrenheit 9/11" will do three times as well as his Columbine movie, which earned a record amount for a documentary film, $21.5 million (11.8 million pounds).
Moore told Reuters afterward that "Fahrenheit" would open in between 500 and 1,000 theatres on June 25, an amazingly high number for a documentary.
