It looks like you're using an Ad Blocker.
Please white-list or disable AboveTopSecret.com in your ad-blocking tool.
Thank you.
Some features of ATS will be disabled while you continue to use an ad-blocker.
(Reuters) - Moviemakers producing a film about the U.S. special forces raid that killed Osama bin Laden are getting help from the Pentagon, but the Obama administration dismissed concerns on Wednesday that classified information has been divulged.
The film, [color=limegreen]focusing on one of President Barack Obama's key successes in office, is due to be released in October 2012, less than a month before the election in which the Democrat is seeking a second term.
Republican Peter King, chairman of the House of Representatives Homeland Security Committee, called on Tuesday for an investigation into contacts between the administration and the filmmakers. King questioned whether special operations methods had been compromised.
"The claims are ridiculous," White House spokesman Jay Carney told a White House briefing.
"We do not discuss classified information. And I would hope that as we face the continued threat from terrorism, the House Committee on Homeland Security would have more important topics to discuss than a movie," Carney added.
U.S. Marine Corps Colonel Dave Lapan, a Pentagon spokesman, said the Defense Department is cooperating with filmmaker Kathryn Bigelow and screenwriter Mark Boal as they work on a motion picture about the raid that killed bin Laden.
The two, who collaborated on the Oscar-winning Iraq war movie "The Hurt Locker," [color=limegreen]had been developing the bin Laden film even before the al Qaeda leader was killed in May in a raid on a compound in the Pakistani city of Abbottabad.
Bigelow and Boal said in their joint statement
In a statement, the pair said their movie covered a period of three different U.S. administrations that searched for bin Laden, including those of Presidents Clinton and Bush.
"This was an American triumph, both heroic and non-partisan, and [color=limegreen]there is no basis to suggest that our film will represent this enormous victory otherwise,"
Reacting to a New York Times column saying the film was timed to give Obama a "home-stretch boost" in his re-election bid, King called for an investigation into the assertion that Bigelow had been given "top-level access to the most classified mission in history."
On the Bigelow film, Lapan said the Defense Department is [color=limegreen]"providing assistance with script research, which is something we commonly do for established filmmakers." Lapan said the Pentagon attempts to help filmmakers and authors but "we do not discuss classified information."
Carney said information provided to the filmmakers "has been focused on the president's role."
"There is no difference in the information that we've given to anybody who's working on this topic from what we gave to those of you in this room who worked on it in the days and weeks after the raid itself," Carney told reporters.
There may be an overtly political reason that moviegoers will be seeing the story of the Osama bin Laden raid just before they vote for president. [color=limegreen]Sony Pictures, the company distributing next year's film, hosted a fundraiser for Barack Obama on their studio's premises in California last April. So far, Sony is the only major studio to hold a political fundraiser this cycle. According to Deadline Hollywood, Sony will release the bin Laden movie, directed by Academy Award-winning director Kathryn Bigelow, on October 12, 2012--less than a month before the presidential election.
[color=limegreen]"The eyebrow does go up when you see the release date," says Douglas Urbanski, a Hollywood producer and conservative radio talk show host. Urbanski said he believes Bigelow's movie will be straightforward and apolitical, much like her 2009 war film The Hurt Locker (which won the Academy Award for Best Picture). But Sony's decision to release the bin Laden movie just weeks before the election, he says, is most likely "very, very deliberate."
Sony Pictures could not immediately be reached for comment.
“Our upcoming film project about the decade long pursuit of Bin Laden has been in the works for many years and integrates the collective efforts of three administrations, including those of Presidents Clinton, Bush, and Obama, as well as the cooperative strategies and implementation by the Department of Defense and the Central Intelligence Agency. Indeed, the dangerous work of finding the world’s most wanted man was carried out by individuals in the military and intelligence communities who put their lives at risk for the greater good without regard for political affiliation. This was an American triumph, both heroic and non-partisan, and there is no basis to suggest that our film will represent this enormous victory otherwise.”
Originally posted by burntheships
Originally posted by xuenchen
I wonder what these folks were REALLY watching ?
maybe a preview of upcoming block busters
If there was ever a photo that looked like a set, that one would be it!
Oh my words just are not enough...this is disheartening news.
sounds like a typical "panicie" disclaimer by the inexperienced and underprepared White House !
Update 10:43 pm CST – FGBA notes that the original picture was posted by the White House with the following caption and disclaimer (emphasis added):
President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden, along with members of the national security team, receive an update on the mission against Osama bin Laden in the Situation Room of the White House, May 1, 2011. Seated, from left, are: Brigadier General Marshall B. “Brad” Webb, Assistant Commanding General, Joint Special Operations Command; Deputy National Security Advisor Denis McDonough; Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton; and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates. Standing, from left, are: Admiral Mike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; National Security Advisor Tom Donilon; Chief of Staff Bill Daley; Tony Binken, National Security Advisor to the Vice President; Audrey Tomason Director for Counterterrorism; John Brennan, Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism; and Director of National Intelligence James Clapper. Please note: a classified document seen in this photograph has been obscured. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)
[color=limegreen]This official White House photograph is being made available only for publication by news organizations and/or for personal use printing by the subject(s) of the photograph. The photograph may not be manipulated in any way and may not be used in commercial or political materials, advertisements, emails, products, promotions that in any way suggests approval or endorsement of the President, the First Family, or the White House.
The White House has refrained from direct engagement with Rep. Peter King’s hearings on domestic radicalization today. But it’s worth noting the testy relationship King, the Republican chairman of the House Committee on Homeland Security, had with the Obama’s powerful counterterrorism advisor, John Brennan. King and Brennan–two strong-willed Irishmen from the New York metro area–have had a couple of heated disputes since Obama took office.
Originally posted by pcrobotwolf
reply to post by xuenchen
Amazing where are all the Obama supporters on this on? This moral retard told us to show the picture of him dead was just crossing the line of decency. Then months later he helps make a movie about to keep his presidential race afloatedit on 11-8-2011 by pcrobotwolf because: (no reason given)