in mainstream theaters and not in adult ones), and called a press conference to insist that the film was a hoax. Rumors persisted that the film showed a real-life murder. Throughout Snuff'''s theatrical run, Shackleton remained purportedly ambiguous about the nature of the film. When interviewed by Variety, he stated: "[If the murder is real], I'd be a fool to admit it. If it isn't real, I'd be a fool to admit it". Prompted by "complaints and petitions from well-known writers, including Eric Bentley and Susan Brownmiller, and legislators", New York District Attorney Robert M. Morgenthau conducted an month-long investigation into the circumstances surrounding the film's production. Morgenthau ultimately dismissed the supposedly "real" murder as "nothing more than conventional trick photography—as is evident to anyone who sees the movie".Liam T. Sanford, "Nasties News", p. 49 (Video Viewer magazine, July 1983) Morgenthau reassured the public that the actress apparently dismembered and killed in the ending of the film was "alive and well", having urged the police to trace her. He also found no basis for criminal prosecution related to pornography statutes, or to consumer fraud laws in regard to the film's advertising. However, Morgenthau stated that he had been "concerned about the fact that this kind of a film might incite or encourage people to commit violence against women". Release Theatrical release Upon its release at the National Theatre in New York City with a $4 ticket price, Snuff grossed $66,456 in its first week. In New York, it outgrossed One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest for three consecutive weeks. During its theatrical run, feminist groups kept protesting Snuff, which influenced city officials in Santa Clara, Philadelphia and St Paul to force theaters to stop showing the film. Twenty women protested the film's return engagement in Rochester, New York at the Holiday Ciné: four of those protesters were arrested after breaking the poster frame to destroy the film's poster. A theater owner in Monticello was prosecuted on obscenity charges. In most places, however, the protests failed to stop the theaters from showing the movie. Home media In the United Kingdom, the film was released on VHS by Astra Video in 1982, coinciding with the start of the video nasty controversy. The cover blurb read "The original legendary atrocity shot and banned in New York" and claimed that "The actors and actresses who dedicated their lives to making this film were never