Inside the Latest Rise of Faith-Driven Movies
While Godzilla stomps its way toward hundreds of millions of dollars in box office revenue, it’s easy to miss some other monstrous results arising from a more heavenly locale: Faith-driven movies. TheWrap took this on in a recent article:
Hollywood worships at the altar of the box office, and the success this year of religious themed-movies has led to a sort of come-to-Jesus moment for studios and reporters alike — as well as a rush by big name conservatives such as Glenn Beck and Rick Santorum to get in on the success.
Many marvel and express surprise over the seemingly out-of-nowhere triumph of films like “God’s Not Dead,” while those in the world of faith-driven films are celebrating the culmination of years of planning and work. TheWrap talked to several industry players — from the producers of the hit movies to the biggest experts in the field — to find out just how these films finally broke out.
The consensus is that the breakout comes largely as a result of technological advances, a few deep pockets, and a solid infrastructure that remained under the radar to most mainstream industry power brokers and observers.
I can still remember from my college days watching some truly laughable movies put out under the banner World Wide Pictures, the film production and distribution wing of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association. Cut to 2014 where there is this:
And this:
Check out these box office numbers relative to production budgets:
Heaven is for Real: $85M / $12M
God’s Not Dead: $59M / $2M
That is some serious ROI. And frankly, this shouldn’t be that hard to figure as TheWrap article notes, there are “90 million Americans who identify themselves as evangelical Christians.” That is a huge target demo.
I know there are a lot of people out there who believe that Hollywood is anti-religion or anti-God. My father used to hit me on this point over and over again. And I would calmly give him the same answer every time: “Dad, the only thing movie studios worship is money. If they believe a religious movie will turn a profit, they will produce that movie.”
Hence, Heaven is for Real, God’s Not Dead, Mom’s Night Out and so forth. And I suspect this trend will only continue as these projects succeed, turning out a reliable audience while movie attendance among young adult males drops 15–20%. Hollywood will persist in going after that group if only because that has been the industry’s habit for decades now. But as they have proven with the increased number of movies targeting Baby Boomers and Seniors, the studios will go after the faith-based audience because Hollywood will go anywhere they believe can be a source of significant revenue.
For the rest of TheWrap article, go here.
UPDATE: Between the time I wrote this post yesterday and it going live today, there was this:
Looking to appeal to faith-based audiences, Samuel Goldwyn Films has acquired U.S. rights to City on a Hill Studio’s music-driven love story “The Song.”
The film stars Alan Powell of the group Anthem Lights, Caitlin Nicol-Thomas (“Nashville”) and Ali Faulkner (“Twilight”). Samuel Goldwyn Films will release the film on Sept. 26.
Richard Ramsey directed from his own script, which is a modern-day adaptation of the life and writings of Solomon, found in the Song of Solomon and Ecclesiastes.
More fodder for the discussion.
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