Armie Hammer’s controversial new movie, Citizen Vigilante, will be shown outside the U.S. after Quiver Distribution gained worldwide rights.
The deal, however, excludes the U.K., German-speaking territories, South Korea and Taiwan, according to Variety.
Director Uwe Boll’s film has faced criticism for its extreme violence and anti-immigrant messaging — with Germany banning the movie.
It is Hammer’s first major role following a five-year hiatus. The Call Me By Your Name actor was touted as one of Hollywood’s hottest prospects before he was accused of rape, sexual misconduct and cannibalism in 2021. Hammer denied all allegations.
The new film sees Hammer play a wealthy American businessman living in Croatia who takes justice into his own hands after becoming angry at violent crime perpetrated by immigrants.
Amid scathing reviews and widespread backlash, Elon Musk threw his support behind the project, sharing it on X in its entirety for users to watch for free for 48 hours over the past weekend.
Replying to a tweet on Sunday claiming the film had become the No. 1 purchased title on Amazon Prime Video in the U.S., Musk wrote: “This is what people want to see.”
Quiver Distribution already holds North American rights and gave the film a limited theatrical release in the U.S. and Canada on June 19.
Speaking to Variety on Monday, Boll revealed that Musk reached out to his team for permission to post the film on X for free.
“There is, of course, a good and a bad side of the X posting,” Boll said. “The question you have to evaluate is: Is that bringing more money in the end, or is that costing me a lot of money? You know, you get a lot of PR, but you don’t get a lot of money. So, we will figure that out in the next four or six weeks.”
Citizen Vigilante is available to buy and rent online in North America, where Boll estimates the film has earned $600,000 against a $2 million budget.
“When you make a successful movie, you always hope that you can make a second part, and it would make sense to send [Sanders, the vigilante played by Hammer] to England or to send him to America, and then we go from there,” he said of a potential sequel.
Boll has defended the film’s controversial themes and himself, insisting in an interview with The Telegraph: “I’m not a Nazi.”
He said: “Now you’re being told that if you’re a conservative about anything – social, sexual, political – that you’re a Nazi. But this is how things stand at the moment.
“If you question anything – such as the hundreds of billions being pumped into Ukraine – then you’re either a friend of Putin or a Nazi or both.”
Hammer said earlier this week that Citizen Vigilante was the first acting job he had been offered in five years, telling The Hollywood Reporter he cried when the call came in.
“It was just this moment where I was like: I’m going to get to do the thing that I love more than anything — other than my children,” he said. “I would have done a f***ing cat food commercial. I just wanted to work again.”
Addressing his fall from grace, Hammer added: “I made these problems for myself. This didn’t happen to me by a fluke accident. I didn’t do what people are saying I did. But I brought very dangerous and unsafe people into my life, and I pissed off people in my life — and here we are.”
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