Hollywood hunk KEVIN COSTNER has arranged for world leaders to see his latest film because he believes they are not taking the possibility of nuclear conflict seriously enough.

American President GEORGE W. BUSH has seen the movie THIRTEEN DAYS, the story of the 1962 Cuban missile crisis, as has former president BILL CLINTON. Costner plans to urge British Prime Minister TONY BLAIR to see the film when he jets into Britain today (12MAR01).

The American ambassador to Britain will screen it tomorrow (13MAR01) with politicians and other VIPs invited. But Costner admits he doesn't expect the movie to be a box office smash, instead he hopes it will reawaken the debate on nuclear arms. He says, "This is clearly a very political movie. We have a smug attitude that this problem has gone away. But the world has thousands of nuclear missiles. Why do we think we're any safer than we were then? But no one wants to hear about this. "My country wiped out 400 different cultures. We don't talk about that very much. We are moving towards the situation there was in 1962 because of the hostility and instability of certain regions of the world." (RP/WNBIN/MCM)

Source: WENN