- guardian.co.uk, Wednesday May 12 2004 11.08 BST
Michael Moore: 'it's a powerful, explosive film, and people loved it'
Miramax chiefs Bob and Harvey Weinstein appear prepared to privately purchase the rights to Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11 after Disney effectively banned the brothers' company from releasing the movie.
According to an unnamed source quoted in the New York Daily News, the Weinsteins are planning to buy the movie - which will have its world premiere at the Cannes film festival on Monday - as individuals and then sell the rights to a third-party distributor, as they did previously with controversial films Kids and Dogma.
Disney pulled the plug on Fahrenheit 9/11 after CEO Michael Eisner claimed that its political content was at odds with a "non-partisan company".
The documentary is reported to explore the links between the Bush and Bin Laden families and to slam what its creator sees as the mismanagement of the US in the wake of the September 11 terrorist attacks.
But yesterday Miramax spokesman Matthew Hiltziki moved to dampen down accusations that the film is unpatriotic, insisting that "it's very respectful of our troops."
Moore, meanwhile, was more bullish, claiming that Fahrenheit 9/11 is "a powerful, explosive film, and people loved it".
Fahrenheit 9/11 is one of 18 movies competing for the Palme D'Or at Cannes. It will be released in the UK later this year by the independent distributor Optimum Releasing.
