Hollywood's Next War Movie Flop

Pretty much every movie made by Hollywood about the Iraq or Afghanistan wars has been a financial flop.  While lefty critics praised them, America didn't buy tickets to see them.

I think this one will go much the same way (from Maureen Dowd):

The White House is also counting on the Kathryn Bigelow and Mark Boal big-screen version of the killing of Bin Laden to counter Obama’s growing reputation as ineffectual. The Sony film by the Oscar-winning pair who made “The Hurt Locker” will no doubt reflect the president’s cool, gutsy decision against shaky odds. Just as Obamaland was hoping, the movie is scheduled to open on Oct. 12, 2012 — perfectly timed to give a home-stretch boost to a campaign that has grown tougher.

The moviemakers are getting top-level access to the most classified mission in history from an administration that has tried to throw more people in jail for leaking classified information than the Bush administration.

It was clear that the White House had outsourced the job of manning up the president’s image to Hollywood when Boal got welcomed to the upper echelons of the White House and the Pentagon and showed up recently — to the surprise of some military officers — at a C.I.A. ceremony celebrating the hero Seals.

Just like W., Obama is going for that “Mission Accomplished” glow (without the suggestive harness). At least in this president’s case, though, something has been accomplished.

Regardless of the heroism of the real-life Navy SEALS involved in this mission (some of whom undoubtedly lost friends in today's helicopter crash), America will see this movie for what it really is - an attempt to make Obama the hero and boost his election chances less than a month before election day. And I hate to say this, but by then the Osama bin Laden mission will be old news. I doubt this movie will do very well at all, and in many cases (like mine) people will stay away just because of the naked attempt to influence the election.

And certainly today's crash makes any attempt to capitalize on the SEALS mission look pretty small.