Freida Pinto starrer ‘Miral’ turning a marketing nightmare for Harvey Weinstein

New York: Julian Schnabel`s ‘Miral’, starring Freida Pinto in the title role, is becoming a marketing nightmare for Harvey Weinstein.

Pinto’s character in the film is based on Schnabel`s real-life Palestinian girlfriend, Rula Jebreal. The message movie will be released by the Weinstein Co. on Dec. 3. It was screened this week at the Venice Film Festival but failed to impress critics. The Hollywood Foreign Press Association, which hands out the Golden Globes, gave Harvey a hard time during a long interview because he`s historically been very supportive of Israel. But "the real problem is the movie is pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel and it is going to be very difficult to get American audiences excited to see it," the New York Post quoted one source as saying. Schnabel left his gorgeous Spanish wife, Olatz, mother of their twin 17-year-old boys, two years ago after meeting Jebreal and deciding to adapt her 2004 novel about a beautiful Palestinian orphan growing up amid ethnic hatred and violence -- much of which is perpetrated by Israeli authorities. "I felt it was my responsibility to [turn] Rula`s book into a film," Schnabel told reporters in Venice this week. "And I thought that I would have something -- coming from my background as an American Jewish person whose mother was the president of Hadassah in 1948 -- I figured I was a pretty good person to tell the other side,” she added. Schnabel`s daughter, Stella, 27, plays a Jewish girl in ‘Miral’ who falls in love with a Palestinian man. ANI