Antiwar film finds distributor

Review

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Filmmaker David O. Russell has found a distributor for a new antiwar documentary that was supposed to be featured on a new DVD of his George Clooney film “Three Kings” before Warner Bros. rejected it.

Cinema Libre Studio announced Sept. 22 it plans to release Russell’s film, “Soldiers Pay,” on a double-bill with the documentary “Uncovered: The War in Iraq.”

“The political (documentary) double-bill makes a powerful duo, complimenting each other with strong arguments about the consequences of war and the lies that were told to get there,” Lauri Blue, spokeswoman for the company, said.

The 35-minute “Soldiers Pay” features interviews with Iraqi refugees, human rights officials and veterans of the current war on Iraq. “Three Kings” starred Clooney, Mark Wahlberg and Ice Cube as three American soldiers searching for gold in Iraq during the Gulf War of the early 1990s.

Warner Bros. officials rejected the finished product as a “polemic about war,” but returned the rights to Russell, freeing him to find distribution elsewhere. The move by Warner Bros. was notable in a year when the Walt Disney Co. cited political sensitivity for its refusal to distribute Michael Moore’s blockbuster “Fahrenheit 9/11.”

Cinema Libre said “Soldiers Pay” and “Uncovered” would start screening together this week in San Francisco, with plans to expand across the country in coming weeks.

“Uncovered” was made by filmmaker Robert Greenwald, who accused Fox News of Republican bias in the recent documentary “Outfoxed” (see review below). Russell’s film also will become part of the “Uncovered” DVD release, set for October 19.