FAHRENHEIT 9/11 Trivia: Disney vs. Michael Moore

Michael Moore, George W. Bush, Fahrenheit 9/11

Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11 was voted Best Non-Fiction Film by the Broadcast Film Critics Association, Chicago Film Critics Association, Dallas-Ft. Worth Film Critics Association, Florida Film Critics Circle, Kansas City Film Critics Circle, Las Vegas Film Critics Society, New York Film Critics Circle, Online Film Critics Society, Phoenix Film Critics Society, San Francisco Film Critics Circle, Southeastern Film Critics Association, and Vancouver Film Critics Circle. It was also the Los Angeles Film Critics Association's runner-up for Best Documentary.

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In April 2003, Mel Gibson's Icon Productions rejected handling Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11 project. Moore later claimed that he had a signed contract with Icon before Gibson bowed out due to pressure from the George W. Bush White House. Icon executives, however, deny that any such contract ever existed.

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Fahrenheit 9/11 was the second documentary to win the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival. The first was Jacques-Yves Cousteau and Louis Malle's Le Monde du silence / The Silent World in 1956.

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Producing company Miramax was forbidden from releasing Fahrenheit 9/11 by its parent company, Walt Disney. When Michael Moore went public about the ban, Disney president Michael Eisner accused the director of cheap self-promotion, for the controversial documentary was to be shown at the Cannes Film Festival in a matter of days. Moore retorted that Eisner had vetoed the distribution of his film because the studio head was afraid that Florida governor Jeb Bush, George W.'s brother, would retaliate by revoking tax breaks granted to Disneyworld and other Disney businesses in that state.

Disney, however, had no qualms about profiting from Fahrenheit 9/11's unprecedented success. In an article for Slate.com, author Edward Jay Epstein states that the studio, which (through Miramax) sold the distribution rights to Fahrenheit 9/11 to Lionsgate and IFC, pocketed — after expenses — approximately US$46 million from the film's theatrical release and DVD sales.

With more than US$220 million in worldwide ticket sales, Fahrenheit 9/11 has become the most financially successful documentary in history.

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Fahrenheit 9/11 has been banned in Kuwait and in Saudi Arabia.

An illegal print of the film was aired on Cuban television in July 2004. Since the showing had not been sanctioned by the producers or the director, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences decided that the picture was to remain eligible in the documentary category.

Eventually, Michael Moore chose not to submit Fahrenheit 9/11 to the Academy's documentary committee, since Moore wanted his film aired on American television before the U.S. presidential election on November 5. (At that time, an Academy rule prevented eligible documentaries — but not fiction films — from being shown on television until nine months after their initial theatrical release.) On his website, Moore stated that other worthy documentaries should get their share of attention, while adding that Fahrenheit 9/11 would still be eligible as Best Picture and in other categories. Ultimately, Fahrenheit 9/11 failed to receive a single Academy Award nomination.

On November 1, an estimated 6.7 million German viewers, representing an 18.6% market share, watched Fahrenheit 9/11 in its first primetime showing on the commercial channel ProSieben, according to the ratings organization AGF/GfK. The documentary's strong anti-Bush stance has been well received in Germany, where an overwhelming majority of the population opposed the Iraq war. The film has amassed approximately US$7 million at the German box office, the second largest take for a documentary in that country, following Moore's own Bowling for Columbine. Source: The Hollywood Reporter.

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