If you haven’t seen the latest hit at the box office, faith-based action movie “Sound of Freedom,” you might want to plan on going to the theater tonight as the movie might not be shown at Cinemark Movies 8 in Paris after today — just 7 days after it was released.
Based on true events, the independent film collecting an impressive $40 million after six days, is the story of Tim Ballard (Jim Caviezel), a former Homeland Security special agent who has devoted himself to fighting child sex trafficking and founded Operation Underground Railroad to rescue hundreds of minors around the globe.
Not only has the movie disrupted the film industry and prompted a dramatic response surrounding child sex trafficking but now movie-goers are reporting theaters are “indirectly discouraging people from seeing the movie due to its controversial subject matter.
TikTok user @belighve1112 uploaded a video that’s accrued more than 6 million likes of the platform, where she and many followers speculate that there might be a concentrated effort to try and stop people from seeing the movie.
She explained that her tickets were refunded due to that particular theater where the film was playing not having air conditioning.
“There was air conditioning in the lobby, there was air conditioning in the hallway, there was air conditioning in the bathrooms, not the theaters?”
One user wrote, “The AMC in Tx was also with no AC,” while another commented, “I’m in California and this happened to us yesterday.” Other users in Illinois, Nevada, and elsewhere also complained of the same exact issue.
Filmed in 2017, Sound of Freedom took five years to release as 20th Century Fox, who held the distributor deal, was purchased by the Walt Disney Company, who later shelved the filmed.
Producer Eduardo Verastegui told The Washington Examiner that no one wanted to distribute the film, including amazon and Netflix, for fears of “losing money.”
It reportedly took Neal Harmon, co-founder and CEO of Angel Studios, and his team a year to negotiate with Disney to acquire the rights back to Sound of Freedom.
While many are praising Angel Studios for releasing the film, the Washington post reported that the movie has been accused by some critics of “warping the truth about child exploitation and catering to QAnon conspiracy theorists” – something it’s distributor, Angel Studios, denies.
Whether or not theaters are indirectly discouraging people or only showing it for a shorter time than most other movies, Cinemark Movies 8 in Paris only has three showings left today – today at 6:20 p.m., 7:10 p.m. and 10:10 p.m.
For movie showings in Paris, click here
