The movie “Gosnell: The Trial of America’s Biggest Serial Killer” was scheduled to open nationwide Oct. 12. The movie is about Dr. Kermit Gosnell, a Philadelphia abortion practitioner who is serving three consecutive life sentences.
In 2013, Gosnell was convicted of murdering three babies born alive, and found guilty of involuntary manslaughter in the overdose death of a refugee at Gosnell’s Women’s Medical Society clinic. The reason for the subtitle, “America’s Biggest Serial Killer,” are the hundreds of babies born alive whom Gosnell is accused of killing. Yes, it’s gruesome stuff, but it’s an important, real-life legal and medical drama.
It’s important, but I had heard and read that the movie was not being publicized by the mainstream media because of Gosnell’s occupation as an abortion provider. One example: Michelle Malkin wrote about the movie Oct. 10 in the National Review, “You’ve probably not heard or read a word about ‘Gosnell’ in the mainstream press, TV news or online.”
I kept an open mind, though, until I looked in the Oct. 11 Portland Press Herald MaineToday Magazine, which listed the movies opening in Maine that week (Page M13). Nope, no listing for the Gosnell movie. “No movie theater in Maine must have booked it this week,” I thought.
But I had a lingering doubt, so I checked with the Portland-area theaters and, sure enough, there were five showings of “Gosnell” every day for the coming week at a Westbrook theater. Yet, no mention of this in MaineToday Magazine’s “Opening in Maine” listings. I sincerely hope that this is an editorial oversight rather than an exercise of “editor as nanny.”
I don’t need a nanny. I need a free, open and unbiased press.
Robert Fischer
Windham
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