The producers of a film about abortionist and convicted murderer Kermit Gosnell have released the movie’s first trailer.
Gosnell: The Trial of America’s Biggest Serial Killer, which stars actor Dean Cain as the detective who ultimately secured the evidence that led to Gosnell’s conviction, is due to finally open October 12 through GVN Releasing after four years.
Filmmakers Anne McElhinney and Phelim McAleer thought they had a distribution deal last year but, as the Hollywood Reporter noted, Judge Jeffrey Minehart – who presided over Gosnell’s trial – sued to block the film’s release because he reportedly was fearful of being portrayed as a member of “Philadelphia’s liberal corrupt government.”
According to the report, Minehart’s lawsuit claimed the producers were “shamelessly exploiting for profit the morally divisive issue of abortion and the notoriety of the horrific Kermit Gosnell trial, which involved a Philadelphia abortion doctor who was found guilty of grisly mass murders of fully developed in-vitro infants, some of whom were born alive.”
McElhinney and McAleer produced Gosnell in 2014 with $2.3 million raised on crowdfunding website Indiegogo and have been trying to get it into theaters ever since.
The movie was directed by actor Nick Searcy of Justified, and also stars Earl Billings as Gosnell.
The movie’s title comes from the 2014 grand jury report that accused the Philadelphia-area abortionist of killing hundreds of newborns in his “house of horrors” clinic over several decades. Gosnell is now serving a life sentence for the murder of three infants – killed as he severed their spinal cords when they were born alive during abortion procedures – and for the involuntary manslaughter of a woman who died following a botched abortion. Additionally, Gosnell was also found guilty on most of the more than 200 counts of violations against Pennsylvania’s informed consent law.
However, as the Hollywood Reporter observed, the film indicts “not only the doctor but also government officials, the legal system and the media for ignoring what the filmmakers say was a pretty sensational trial in 2013.”
The trailer shows the empty courtroom scene, based on a journalist’s photo that became a symbol of the media’s decision to ignore the horrors of the abortion clinic.
During an interview with Breitbart News in January 2017, McAleer said, “The most shocking thing I found was how many people knew.”
He added:
Health officials, doctors in emergency rooms who were seeing and fixing the results of his butchery – even the Philadelphia homicide department was notified. The National Abortion Federation was notified; there were trainee nurses passing through his house of horrors; the coroner’s office saw the bodies of the women and babies – and they all said nothing.
“This is in Philadelphia, not a third world country or a rural backwater in America,” McAleer stressed. “It also shows the pointlessness of big government and regulations – they are never enforced when it is politically expedient.”
“No matter what your stance is on abortion, you will have a more informed opinion after you see Gosnell,” said Searcy.