Amazon pulls ‘Melania’ in Oregon cinema after it mocked documentary
The Lake Theater and Cafe in Lake Oswego has been ordered by Amazon to pull its screening of the Melania documentary after gentle mockery about the film appeared on its marquee.
The theatre, which is known for its creative advertisements of upcoming movies, marketed the film with the declaration, “Does Melania wear Prada? Find out Friday.”
Inspired by Sun Tzu’s famous The Art of War, they also shared the advertisement, “To defeat your enemy, you must know them. Melania starts Friday.”
As per The Hollywood Reporter, the manager Jordan Perry shared that their booker received a call from a worker at Amazon, who ordered the organisation to pull the film.
Perry told local outlet The Oregonian, “The studio was not happy and/or did not appreciate my take on marketing their film to our own public,” Perry told The Oregonian.
The theatre marquee was soon updated with a new advertisement: “Amazon called. Our marquee made them mad. All Melania showings cancelled. Show your support at Whole Foods instead.”
The cinema followed this up with “Join Amazon Prime for Free Two-Day Shipping.”
The whole affair was shared on Instagram, where the theatre and cafe shared that they had received much backlash from local moviegoers over their choice to show the film, before it was taken down by orders from the top.
They explained on Instagram that they had received “countless emails and voicemails and Google / Yelp reviews (Google / Yelp took them down), wondering why the hell we had Melania here, or disdaining our disparaging of her. Now that it’s prematurely over, the plug pulled on us not from public outcry (always listening, thank you) but by some corporate executive.”
Though Amazon chose to pull the project, Melania will also no longer be shown in cinemas in South Africa. Thobashan Govindarajulu, the head of sales and marketing for the regional distributor, Filmfinity, confirmed, “Based on recent developments, we’ve taken the decision to not go ahead with a theatrical release in the territory.”
Additionally, the director behind the film, Brett Ratner, has recently been pictured embracing a young woman in the Epstein files. He has since insisted that the woman photographed next to him and Epstein was his fiancée at the time.
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