Film Release and Box Office
The film was released theatrically by The Fellowship Adventure Group through a distribution arrangement with Lions Gate Entertainment. On its opening weekend of June 25 – June 27, 2004, the film generated box-office revenues of $23.9 million in the U.S. and Canada, making it the weekend's top-grossing film. Its opening weekend earned more than the entire U.S. theatrical run of any other feature-length documentary (including Moore's previous film, Bowling for Columbine). The film was released in the UK on July 2, 2004 and in France on July 7, 2004.
Moore credited part of the theatrical success to the efforts of conservative groups to pressure theaters not to run the film, conjecturing that these efforts backfired by creating publicity. There were also efforts by liberal groups such as MoveOn.org (who helped promote the film) to encourage attendance in order to defy their political opponents' contrary efforts.
Fahrenheit 9/11 was screened in a number of Middle Eastern countries, including the United Arab Emirates, Lebanon, and Egypt, but was immediately banned in Kuwait. "We have a law that prohibits insulting friendly nations," said Abdul-Aziz Bou Dastour of the Kuwaiti Information Ministry. The film was not shown in Saudi Arabia as public movie theaters are not permitted. The Saudi ruling elite subsequently launched an advertising campaign spanning nineteen US cites to counter criticism partly raised in the film.
The film was shown in Iran, an anomaly in a nation in which American films had been banned since the Iran hostage crisis in 1979. Iranian film producer and human rights activist Banafsheh Zand-Bonazzi communicated with Iranians who saw the film, and claimed that it generated a pro-American response.
In Cuba, bootlegged versions of the film were shown in 120 theaters, followed by a prime-time television broadcast by the leading state-run network. It had been widely reported that this might affect its Oscar eligibility. However, soon after that story had been published, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences issued a statement denying this, saying, "If it was pirated or stolen or unauthorized we would not blame the producer or distributor for that." In addition, Wild Bunch, the film's overseas distributor for Cuba, issued a statement denying a television deal had been struck with Cuban Television. The issue became moot, however, when Moore decided to forgo Oscar eligibility in favor of a pay-per-view televising of the film on November 1, 2004.
Read more about this topic: Fahrenheit 9/11
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