Too bad I live in a culturally challenged area (Fresno in Central California). Regal Theaters has bought up all five theaters in town. They have a total monopoly. They are a huge chain and give no indication they will show it anywhere at any time. Why? Regal's (Regal Entertainment Group) principal owner is Phillip Anshutz. His corporation is the largest motion picture exhibitor in the world (it operates nearly 20 percent of all indoor screens in the US) -- and is a growing force in Hollywood. Anshutz is also aleading religious right culture warrior.
Between 1995 and 2000, according to OpenSecrets.org, the website of the Center for Responsive Politics, the Anschutz Corporation, and assorted members of the Anschutz family, donated nearly $700,000 to the GOP and its candidates.
Over the years, Anschutz-related entities have helped bankroll a number of ultraconservative political organizations, including:
Colorado for Family Values (CFV) -- the organization behind Amendment 2, Colorado's notorious anti-gay constitutional amendment approved by the voters in 1992 and later overturned by the US Supreme Court.
Enough is Enough (website), whose President and Chair of its Board of Directors is Donna Rice Hughes (the major figure in the sex scandal that ended the 1987 campaign of Gary Hart, in the Democratic presidential primary). Enough is Enough claims that it is "Lighting the way to protect children and families from the dangers of illegal Internet pornography and sexual predators."
Morality in the Media (website), established in 1962 "to combat obscenity and uphold decency standards in the media."
"We expect them [movies] to be entertaining, but also to be life affirming and to carry a moral message," Philip Anschutz told an audience at the conservative Christian Hillsdale College last year.
Anschutz "was branded the greediest executive in America by Fortune magazine ... topping a list that included ... Gary Winnick, founder of Global Crossing."
