‘Fahrenheit 9/11’ hits the airwaves

Michael Moore’s Bush-bashing “Fahrenheit 9/11” got a last-minute reprieve when it was aired on pay-per-view and satellite television as well as the Internet on Monday night, the eve of the U.S. presidential election.

The satellite-based Dish Network, owned by EchoStar Communications Corp., reported “strong interest” on the part of its 10-million-viewer subscriber base. Still, citing corporate policy, the company declined to say how many of them paid to watch the film, which, with nearly $120 million in box-office receipts, is the highest-grossing feature-length documentary ever.

Video-on-demand service CinemaNow streamed the film online to more than 30 million households with broadband Internet access. The Los Angeles-based TVN Entertainment delivered it to about 1 million homes through various satellite systems. How many people actually watched either feed wasn’t immediately known.

Though the deal with TVN was cut last week, details of the arrangement with Dish and CinemaNow were still being hammered out as late as Monday afternoon. Each outlet charged $9.95 per showing. The Moore camp said it was donating its portion of the profits to a veterans’ charity.