Blocking Promotion of Critical Musk Documentary? TikTok Suspends Account Following X

Controversy has erupted after TikTok, following in the footsteps of X (formerly Twitter), blocked promotional efforts for the documentary film "Musk," which takes a critical look at world-renowned billionaire Elon Musk.

According to U.S. entertainment media outlet The Hollywood Reporter and others on October 18 (local time), short-form social media platform TikTok suspended the advertising account for the film "Musk," citing violations of its political content policy.

Bleecker Street, the distributor of "Musk," stated that it began receiving warnings from TikTok on October 16 that its paid sponsored ads would be permanently suspended, making it impossible to boost content exposure through paid marketing.

This action came precisely at a time when the film, after opening in four theaters in New York and Los Angeles (LA), was expanding its release to 470 theaters for the weekend and needed to go all-out with its marketing.

TikTok explained on the morning of October 18 that the restriction on the advertising account was an error, and that it has now been restored to normal.

For the distributor, this meant missing out on the golden weekend window to promote the film from Friday through Saturday.

Prior to this, TikTok reportedly blocked posts related to the film "Musk" from featuring trailers under the guise of political content and issued warnings that it was seriously violating political policies.

"Musk" is a documentary that delves into Musk's childhood trauma, private life, allegations of X algorithm manipulation, activities in the Donald Trump administration, ties to far-right political forces, and contradictory and absurd remarks.

Director Alex Gibney described Musk as an "extremely dangerous person," to which Musk fired back with a harsh reaction, saying, "Dog shit deserves more respect than Gibney."

After the film was invited to the Venice Film Festival—one of the world's top three film festivals—and opened in North America, X, owned by Musk, outright refused to run paid advertisements for the movie.

Meta and YouTube also previously refused to run the ads citing political content, only to reverse their decisions and claim it was an "error" amid mounting controversy.

Because TikTok has no direct connection to Musk, attention is also focused on the background behind the account suspension.

Larry Ellison, the founder of Oracle who leads TikTok's U.S. operations, briefly appears in the film "Musk."

A text message in which Ellison offers to invest billions of dollars in Musk was also revealed in the film.

Both Ellison and Musk are prominent business figures considered close associates of President Donald Trump and are supporters of the Republican Party.

(Photo: Getty Images)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.