Bush Assassination Film Being Rejected by Major Theater Chains

The movie which offers a fictionalized version of President Bush's assassination and was all the rage in Toronto, is having a hard time finding major theater chains in the U.S. willing to show it:

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - Newmarket Films set itself an unusual challenge when it decided to release the controversial faux investigative documentary "Death of a President" just six weeks after acquiring the movie at the Toronto International Film Festival last month.

But it might face an even more formidable obstacle because several major theater chains are refusing to play the film, which mixes real news footage with dramatized segments depicting the fictional 2007 death of President Bush.

Newmarket, the 12-year-old Los Angeles-based film financing, production and distribution company, plans to open the film October 27, just in time for the November 7 election...

But the country's largest theater chain, Regal Entertainment Group, has passed on playing the film, citing the subject matter as the primary reason. "We would not be inclined to program this film," Regal Entertainment Group CEO Mike Campbell said. "We feel it is inappropriate to portray the future assassination of a sitting president, regardless of political affiliation."

Texas-based Cinemark USA also has declined to play the indie film, corporate spokesman Terrell Falk said. The circuit, which recently completed its acquisition of northern California-based Century Theatres, will not allow the regional player to book the film either. "We're not playing it on any of our screens," Falk said. "It's a subject matter we don't wish to play. We decided to pass on the film."

I'm sure there will be plenty of art houses where the weirdos can go see it, but I'm glad they won't be showing up at the major chains where I go with my family (we see most of our movies at Regal theaters).