NEW YORK (AP) – Even before “The Dissident” premiered at the Sundance Film Festival, director Bryan Fogel had the feeling that his explosive Jamal Khashoggi documentary would be a hard sell.
The film, which is available on demand this week, was one of the most anticipated Sundance of January last year. Fogel’s previous film, “Icarus”, about Russian doping in the Olympics, won the Oscar award for best documentary. “The Dissident” contains audio recordings of the murder of Khashoggi, the participation of Khashoggi’s fiancé, Hatice Cengiz, and details of Saudi burglary attempts, including the infiltration of the cell phone of Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon. The audience at Sundance includes Hillary Clinton, Alec Baldwin and Netflix CEO Reed Hastings.
At the show, Fogel begged media companies not to be afraid. “In my dream of dreams, distributors Saudi Arabia will rise,” he said. Fogel, who drove in an SUV to the film’s Sundance-after party, said he was hopeful that Netflix, Amazon, HBO or others would come forward – anyone who could give the film a global platform for Khashoggi. ‘s story, which plays as deadly, real geopolitical thriller in ‘The Dissident’.
But the rough road ahead for ‘The Dissident’ has already been indicated. None of the streamers – many of whom bought Sundance’s top films – asked for a preview of “The Dissident” before the festival – something that can be expected for such a sensational documentary from a filmmaker who won an Oscar victory achieved. .
‘A lot of the big streamers were actually there that day. Not their content heads. Their CEOs. I would have hoped it would lead to, ‘We’re going to get behind this movie.’ But it did not, ”Fogel told Zoom in Los Angeles last month. We did not have an offer of $ 1, let alone $ 1 million – let alone the $ 12 million paid for Boys State. which is a great movie, but it’s about 17 year old boys playing spot politics in Texas. ”
‘The Dissident’, set in a relentlessly real political empire, will finally launch on demand on Friday. It was finally acquired last spring, in an agreement announced in September, by Briarcliff Entertainment, the independent distributor founded by Tom Ortenberg, the veteran executive who distributed ‘Spotlight’ and ‘Snowden’ as CEO of Open Road Films. After a two-week tour in about 200 theaters (scaled down from 800 due to the pandemic), ‘The Dissident’ will be available for rent in places like iTunes, Amazon and Roku.
But the cool reception from major media companies on ‘The Dissident’ – not because it was not good (it received a 97% fresh Rotten Tomatoes rating from critics and a 99% audience rating) ) or important, but because it openly disputes the Saudi regime’s attack on freedom of speech – raises questions about the future of political films on ever-larger and potentially increasingly risk-averse streaming services.
Netflix et al played an important role in the exponentially growing audiences for documentaries. But as they seek global growth in subscribers, media companies have sometimes capitulated to claims bordering on censorship. In 2019, Netflix removed an episode of Hasan Minhaj’s “Patriot Act” that condemned the cover-up of Khashoggi’s murder following a Saudi charge. Last month, The New York Times reported that Apple CEO Tim Cook had flattened an Apple TV + series developed by Gawker. Negative depictions of China, for both old Hollywood studios and streamers, are usually off the table.
“If there’s a lot of money at stake – business interest, shareholder liability, which is going to make us vanilla and not cause tension, is the win,” says Fogel. “As these companies get bigger and bigger, we see that the choices they make, including content, are becoming less and less risky.”
For Fogel, the experience of “The Dissident” reflects the silence of Khashoggi. The film, funded by the Human Rights Foundation, an outline of a conspiracy to assassinate Khashoggi, a former Saudi insider who turned on the Washington Post columnist who made moderate pleas for his homeland to accept freedom of speech and human rights. When he recorded paperwork for his marriage to Hatice Cengiz at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October 2018, he was killed and his body was sawn to pieces. Intelligence reports have concluded that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman ordered the assassination. Mohammed denied that Saudi Arabia was behind the killing, and eventually admitted that it was carried out by Saudi government agents.. Mohammed claims that it was not according to his orders.
“The Dissident” contains interviews with Cengiz, Turkish authorities and United Nations investigators who concluded that Bezos, who owns the Washington Post, was hacked by a malicious file sent from Mohammed’s personal WhatsApp account.. The same burglary scheme was allegedly used for the banned activist Omar Abdulaziz, a collaborator of Khashoggi. “The Dissident” ultimately questions why countries and companies continue to do business with a country that uses such methods, jails or kills prisons.
“I hope this film will keep Jamal’s name and Jamal’s life and his values alive,” says Cengiz, telephonically from Istanbul. “I hope people will ask more and more and more.”
President Donald Trump refuses to blame Mohammed for assassination, and is quoted in Bob Woodward’s latest book boasting that he “saved” the crown prince. Elected President Joe Biden has indicated a tougher stance on Saudi Arabia. Cengiz called on the CIA to classify its investigation into the murder.
She also continued Khashoggi’s mission. “It was not my choice, but it’s my life,” she says. That American film companies may have been deterred by “The Dissident” is ‘disappointing’.
“I could not imagine that they were not going to buy this movie because this movie is talking about a very important crime in history,” says Cengiz. ‘This film is about someone who fought for many important values. That’s why they killed him. So that’s why we fight. ”
In particular, Netflix’s disgust with “The Dissident” is “incredibly disappointing,” Fogel said. “Icarus” Netflix Wins First Oscar. A Netflix spokesman declined to comment on the company that released The Dissident. In November, the streamer entered into a production agreement with Saudi studio Telfaz11 for eight films.
But Fogel is also clear about the possible dangers associated with spreading ‘The Dissident’, while considering the possibility of a Saudi invasion or a Middle Eastern boycott of a distributor.
“Ultimately, these risk assessments took the place of whether their few hundred million subscribers would like to see the film,” says Fogel. “It was not just Netflix, but universal as well. What I think Hollywood has learned from the Sony hack is that the risk of embarrassment is too high. ”
Ortenberg, on the other hand, was comfortable with the headache the dissident would bring. “The film speaks for itself,” says Ortenberg, telephonically from Los Angeles. He suggests ‘The Dissident’ for consideration of awards.
“It’s a shame,” Ortenberg says of other studios’ concerns. “I always saw the entertainment film studios as the leader on important topics and did not run away from controversy, but actually accepted challenges, and took on the challenge of making films on important topics and treating them with respect.”
Fogel sees a lack of international and corporate will to respond to human rights violations that are only getting worse in Hollywood and elsewhere. Last week, the Saudi state security court sentenced 31-year-old Loujiain Al-Hathloul to more than five years in prison for tweets advocating for women’s right to drive, arguing against male guardianship regulations.. She has been in jail since May 2018 and said she was tortured and sexually assaulted by masked men during interrogations.
‘I do believe that people in such positions of power, with wealth and resources, are not prepared to stand up for such a violation of human rights, because what I consider to be the greatest benefit of the planet is becoming an increasing narrow place for us to live, ”says Fogel. “We are all becoming less safe.”
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