CNN is running a story
here discussing a Loews theater chain pulling "Get Rich or Die Tryin'" from their theater following a shooting death in the theater's lobby. The article and the Loews execs quoted carefully avoid the issue of race, but I'm thinking it's playing a part.
More after the Jump
The article states that:
The Loews theater chain pulled rapper 50 Cent's new film "Get Rich or Die Tryin' " from a theater near Pittsburgh after a man was shot to death in the lobby Wednesday night.
Police said Shelton Flowers, 30, of Wilkinsburg, Pennsylvania, was shot at 11:06 p.m. and died later at an area hospital.
Further,
It is not clear whether the individuals involved in the shooting had just left the screening of "Get Rich," which had started at 10 p.m., but Reid ackowledged that they had come from that direction.
And finally, Loews president Reid lets us know their thoughts:
"There was a lot of preparation done for this film after Paramount's research told us that it was drawing a primarily young male crowd," Reid said. "We had taken all the precautions possible to limit any possibility of violence, but I'm skeptical that the film itself incited it. I think it was more an issue where the wrong people came into contact with each other."
First of all, the article doesn't say whether Flowers was at any showing of the 50 Cent movie. Second,
It is not clear whether the individuals involved in the shooting had just left the screening of "Get Rich," which had started at 10 p.m., but Reid ackowledged that they had come from that direction.
"Get Rich" is a 112 minute movie. The shooting occurred at 11:06, so the "individuals involved" probably weren't at the 10pm show anyways, so you might be curious why the execs make this assumption and what it has to do at all with the movie's content.
Who wants to provide the obvious word left out in this description?: "primarily young male crowd"....
How about "African-American"? Do you think that's perhaps there, left unspoken?
The movie company, based on no apparent evidence of anything linking the shooting, the victim or the individuals involved to "Get Rich", pull "Get Rich." Hmmmm.
Interested in hearing people's thoughts.