Los Angeles - A film dramatising the death of Osama bin Laden is set to
debut next month on the National Geographic Channel, two days before the
US presidential election.
"Seal Team Six: The Raid on Osama bin Laden,"
from The Weinstein Company and Voltage Pictures, will air on Sunday, 4
November, the channel said on Thursday. President Barack Obama faces
Republican challenger Mitt Romney at the polls two days later.
Weinstein
co-chairperson Harvey Weinstein is a prominent fundraiser for Obama's
re-election campaign, which has touted bin Laden's death as an example
of the president's leadership.
National Geographic Channel chose
the film's debut date to help promote the start of its fall season,
channel President Howard T Owens said on Thursday.
"Harvey
obviously doesn't schedule our network," Owens said. He added that the
channel is "not political. We are opportunistic from a programming
perspective".
National Geographic Channel did take into account
Weinstein's desire to get out ahead of a competitive movie about the US
Navy SEALs' hunt for the al-Qaeda leader, Owens said.
"Zero Dark Thirty," from director Kathryn Bigelow and screenwriter Mark Boal, who won Oscars for "The Hurt Locker", is scheduled to be released in theatres at the end of the year.
Longest manhunt in American history
"Seal Team Six,"
directed by John Stockwell ("Into the Blue"), also was intended for a
big-screen release until the channel made what it called a "pre-emptive
bid" for it. The film will be available to Netflix US subscribers a day
after its premiere.
Owens said he and Weinstein have a previous
business relationship: Owens represented Miramax Television while
working at the William Morris Agency.
"Seal Team Six,"
whose cast includes Cam Gigandet, Anson Mount, Freddy Rodriquez and
Xzibit, is the channel's first original film drawn from real events and
is part of a programming expansion that includes the recently announced
"Killing Lincoln", based on Bill O'Reilly's best-selling book.
The
depiction of the bin Laden raid in Pakistan was vetted by experts that
included a recently retired Navy SEAL and a bin Laden historian, the
channel said.
"While some aspects of the characterisations have
been dramatised for creative reasons, the core story is an accurate
portrayal of an event that ended the longest manhunt in American
history," according to a news release from the channel.
- AP