Notes From D.R. | Random Thoughts on the Passing Scene

Why did United 93 and Akeelah and the Bee underperform at the box office this weekend?

Much has been made of liberals thinking that it’s "too soon" to make a 9/11-based movie, so United’s lack of support in the blue states was a given. However, despite Rush Limbaugh’s extensive promotion of the film on his radio show, I suspect that many conservatives had no interest in seeing Hollywood’s take on the event that prompted a War on Terror many folks in Hollywood don’t support. If the entertainment industry weren’t so disdainful of the concept of using the US military to stamp out Islamofascism (and the President who has led us into two wars based on that concept), the red states would have probably rushed out in droves to see the film. Surely there were many Republicans who thought the film was simply an attempt to exploit or make money off 9/11; would they have believed this if Hollywood had more people like Bruce Willis and less people like Susan Sarandon? If the right had a general sense that Hollywood endorsed the US military’s anti-terrorism efforts, the film would have been a huge hit. However, conservatives obviously noted that Universal Pictures, which released United 93, just last week released American Dreamz, a film in which Dennis Quaid portrays a caricatured version of the Commander-in-Chief–and also released Steven Spielberg’s Munich, which was seen a veiled criticism of the War on Terror. Couple this with the recent controversy over such films as V for Vendetta, and you can understand why so many conservatives weren’t interested in seeing Hollywood’s vision of 9/11.

As for Akeelah and the Bee, Hollywood writer David Poland has a provocative theory as to why the movie bombed. Sadly, the failure of this movie may cause Hollywood executives to think that only violent black-themed movies will draw money. And that’s a shame.