9/11 Doc Hits TV, DVD (But Where Was the Theatrical)

I noticed a Reuters story last week about Linda Ellman's upcoming film On Native Soil: The Documentary of the 9/11 Commission Report, which has been acquired by Court TV and Lionsgate. The television premiere and the DVD release will both happen in mid-August, one day apart.

But something is nagging me about this - On Native Soil was on the shortlist for last year's Feature Documentary Oscar, and for the life of me, I can't find one example of a theatrical or festival screening for the film - something that is supposed to be required to qualify for Oscar consideration.

This Variety profile mentions that "(t)he film was in theaters for an Oscar-qualifying run by July" but I've yet to find confirmation that this is true. It certainly was not part of last year's IDA Docuweek program, nor did it garner any press or attention during what would have been a mandatory week-long run in Los Angeles, which seems hard-to-believe for such a high-profile film.

But there's more - David Poland wrote last November that the film was completed in August, too late for the July run that Variety reported. Says Poland:

     And then there is On Native Soil: The Documentary of
     the 9/11 Commission Report, which was finished
     sometime in August, has not played any festivals that
     I know of and was way off the radar because I don't
     think anyone knew it was Oscar qualified by the time
     the qualification closed on September 1.

I'll be the first to admit that the often-byzantine documentary branch rules may be the primary cause of my confusion over this project - and if it did have a theatrical run that was never reported in the press, well, then I stand corrected. (I invite any and all with direct knowledge of the situation to comment.) But here's a film that, to my knowledge at least, never played a single film festival nor had any publicised theatrical screenings, and seems to be having a television premiere. Isn't this what the new documentary rules were supposed to prevent?

Comments

[Linda Ellman]

Thank you for taking notice of my film, "On Native Soil: The Documentary of the 9/11 Commission Report. It did indeed have a qualifying run... check out the dates at this link: http://www.laemmle.com/viewmovie.php?mid=1558
You are correct about the festivals, unfortunately, we did not go to any. Thankfully, the film is finally going to be seen and it is getting great reviews. Court TV is airing an 88 minute version--commercial free on Monday August 21st at 10p ET/PT, 9p CT. Lionsgate purchased the film and is releasing the full 119 minute version on DVD (plus extras.) I would still like to see it released theatrically. Feel free to let Lionsgate know if you would like that too! Check out the review in the NY Post and at Reuters..a few samples of how it's being received.

[AJ Schnack]

Linda, thanks so much for writing. I do stand corrected. I had, in fact, talked to someone who thought they remembered your film playing a qualifying run, but I couldn't find anything, so I failed to update this post.

I'm curious about your not playing festivals as this seems like such a high profile film - an important subject, narrated by two Oscar winners. Can you talk about that at all? Seems that after your shortlisting you probably were invited to festivals, no?

Thanks,
AJ