Originally Posted by The Article

The film Death of the President, which includes a graphically manipulated scene of President George W. Bush being assassinated, will be released in the U.S. on Oct. 27, and the Penn State community has mixed feelings about it.

The fictional documentary, by British director Gabriel Range, secured a distribution deal on Sept. 11 for wide release in the U.S. after its debut at the Toronto International Film Festival.

Newmarket Films, the company responsible for films such as The Passion of the Christ and Memento, purchased the film rights for a reported $1 million.

The film takes place in 2007 and begins with the assassination of President Bush; it then explores the events that follow.

While hype surrounding the assassination scene has led to some protest in the U.S., it has stirred interest and debate within the Penn State community.

Clay Calvert, professor of communications and law and the co-director of the Pennsylvania Center for the First Amendment, said despite how offensive the film may be, the filmmaker is within his first amendment rights to make such a film.

"Political speech lies at the heart of the first amendment," Calvert said. "While the movie Death of a President may be offensive to many people, the first amendment clearly protects speech that is offensive."

But has the film gone too far in including an assassination scene of the sitting president?

Seth Bender, now former chairman of College Republicans, said the subject matter was inappropriate.

"The fact that a film is coming out portraying the assassination of a sitting U.S. president, I find absolutely sickening," Bender said. "I think that everyone should be disgusted at that."

Eliot Schmidt, College Democrats spokesman, said he felt the film didn't cross the line.

"How much violence is on TV, and nobody raises any questions or problems about movies that revolve around genocide and things like that," Schmidt said.

Matt Jordan, assistant professor in the Department of Film, Video and Media Studies, wrote in an e-mail message that the issue was a matter of taste.

"The filmmaker ... is obviously responding to some global sentiment out there by people who fantasize about such a thing," Jordan wrote. "This seems like a reasonable thing to address artistically, as global anti-American sentiment has never been as pronounced as it is today."

Some students said they expect a reaction from the Penn State community when the film is released in the U.S.

"Something like this film would be sort of similar to if Michael Moore came out with another film, or the conservative version of him would come out with a film," Schmidt said. "I think it would just add to the current debate."

Sameer Barkawi (sophomore-film and English) felt that political issues over the president could inhibit people from going to see the film.

"There's a big majority of people who still support Bush in the country, and I think they will be completely disgusted by the idea of it," Barkawi said.

C. Michael Elavsky, assistant professor in the Department of Film, Video and Media Studies, has confidence in Penn State students that they will accept the film as something to be explored.

"Most of the students here are intellectuals who are going to be able to think through the issues," Elavsky said. "This is what art in the greatest sense does, it provokes and stimulates conversation, discussion, criticism, debate."

Jordan wrote that peoples' reaction to the film might provide the most insight.

"For those who get outraged and loudly decry a film by a British filmmaker that has only been shown in Canada up to this point, the old line of 'Me thinks thou dost protest too much' is probably the best response," Jordan wrote.

"But then again, having a strong opinion about something that you have not seen seems to be an unalienable right in America."