at the crime scene. Suerd is found guilty and imprisoned. Some observers doubt his guilt, because his clothes were not bloody. In addition, there is evidence he was engaged in an IRC room at the times of the murders. Before his conviction can be appealed, Suerd dies in prison of unknown causes. Authorities consider the case closed. Leigh receives a box containing a damaged videotape reel, which he at first assumes is tape from the Fact or Fiction team, although none was believed to exist. He hires data retrieval expert Shelly Monarch to reconstruct the images on the tape. She finds that Wheeler and Clacklin's murders were caught on tape, and Suerd could not have killed them. She finds a blurred image of the real killer. As Leigh videotapes her, Monarch uses an image editor to re-construct the image of the killer's face. She completes this image before Leigh's next visit, and is shocked to discover that the killer is Leigh himself. The camera "shifts" to a third-person perspective, whereas all previous footage had been "shot" by Leigh. From this perspective, viewers see Leigh attack Monarch and suffocate her with a piece of plastic sheeting. He loads her body into his car, drives it out to the woods, and dumps it in a clearing. He begins to tape himself narrating the next segment of his documentary. Cast Production The film was made on a budget of $900, and edited on a desktop computer using Adobe Premiere 4.2. $600 was allocated for production, while $240 were utilized for digital video stock, and twenty hours of tape for $12 each. Release The Last Broadcast premiered regionally at the County Theater in Doylestown, Pennsylvania on March 9, 1998. It was released theatrically through Avalos and Weiler's independent distribution company, Wavelength Releasing, in seven U.S. cities on October 23, 1998, including Providence, Rhode Island; Orlando, Florida; Minneapolis, Minnesota; and Portland, Oregon. Because the film was not shot on film stock, the screenings were arranged to the select theaters via satellite streaming. The film grossed $12,097 at the U.S. box office and had a worldwide profit of $4 million. Critical response The film received mixed reviews from critics and audiences, earning an approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes of 50% based on 18 critic reviews. Steven Rea and Desmond Ryan of The Philadelphia Inquirer deemed the film "startlingly good" and a "smart, assured work." Dave Jewett