Low cost Christian films rake in major bucks

Filmmakers Alex and Stephen Kendrick seem to have the formula down — grossing nearly $80 million on four films made for less than $4 million combined. Only thing is the Kendrick brothers work far from Hollywood and, outside the world of Christian-themed cinema, many have never heard of their films.

So these two guys have figured out a formula that Hollywood really wants, movies that are low cost to make and rake in huge payoffs. While I understand most people here aren't really interested in Christian themed movies (in fact I think it usually makes for largely boring and preachy edutainment) this could end up being a fairly successful business model that people will likely try to capitalize on.

Oh also I want a movie about the life and times of Job just for kicks.

http://news.yahoo.com/2-bible-belt-filmmakers-expand-box-office-horizons-163252880.html

The Book of Job is pretty interesting, it would probably make it good movie (if done right of course). From what I hear "The Bible" and "Son of God" did pretty good recently, and then there are classic movies like The Ten Commandments and Ben-Hur. I have heard that there is consumer demand for more faith-based, Bible movies and movies that generally align with the values of most Americans.

Made me think of this:

Considering how ridiculous the most recent Christian-themed Hollywood movies have been, I'm not surprised that something a little more humble fared better.

Good for them.

If the quality of these recent movies indicate anything, it's that the films themselves have little to no staying power. $80 million spread across 4 films is peanuts in 2014, especially when you consider how high ticket prices are. Placing Ben-Hur with these recent films is superficial at best, since it's a historical epic and not at all a "Bible movie".

Still the best one.


lollllllllllllllll

@Aljosa23: Man, the epic music...XD

Simpsons did it first.

I see your God's Not Dead and raise you

I wouldn't mind these idiotic films if they had anything else going for them other than their heavy handed Christian messages. The acting, direction, writing, editing, etc. all suck. These are paint by number and cliche ridden films made primarily to make money off of morons who can't comprehend the idea that they can find similar themes in other, much better, films that don't rely strictly on preaching.

LOL that trailer. jesus christ (pun intended)

They're just exploitation films. They don't need to put effort into it, idiots will watch it anyway.

That almost seems like satire to me.

Isn't that pretty much the exact same plot as God's Not Dead, only this one has a man holding a rubber chicken?

Also why would a creationist be studying biology?

doesn't mean that you are a rainbow and an atheist ... you have to be angry all the time.

Cheer up and be happy for others

Critically speaking, Son of God was pretty bad. It's sad to see people using Jesus' image to make major bucks. And I wouldn't even consider Noah to be a biblical film. I'm not expecting anything about Exodus either.

They should make a movie where Jesus comes back as a private eye that investigates religious based crimes

The problem with those movies is that they pander to their audience. Even if most of these movies have interesting concepts, they are often executed poorly

Holy shit those two movie trailers...

I think I would have to stop being friends with someone who thought either of those films were genuinely good and putting out a great message...

"Stupid is, what stupid does" - Forrest Gump

They're all based on complete fiction, so it's not like they're basing it on a real life story or anything.

I remember seeing this somewhere. Did one of the OT members make a thread about this once before?

I'm more of an evolutionist than a creationist myself but overall I'm apathetic toward it but probably will watch it if it's a good christian movie.

Quick offtopic question to the Christians: Should I watch "the passion of Christ?" Is it in anyway offensive to you or does it depict Jesus in a manner that you won't approve? Because I rather not watch it if it's offensive...

I thought this thread was going to be about Constantine, I love that film. Bring more movies like that.

THIS.

Exploitation films are awesome. I could get a kick out of watching these.

Not that kind of exploitation film

I've yet to see exploitation that wasn't gold in some way or another.

Watch Jesus Camp for an unintentional horror film.

I felt so bad for the children in that film.

Well, fiction often makes good entertainment.

Why is this even a thread? what are you trying to debate?

Because everyone knows that South Park wasn't kidding or lying when they say that some christians are dumber than wet cardboard and that you can sell anything to them as long as its something to do with the bible.

not everything is a debate dude, sometimes I just post a news piece to see what people's reactions to it are.

wow.....just...no wonder some people have a sick hatred of college professors.

@sammyjenkis898: I still can't get over how those movies soundtracks always make it sound like they should be jumping off cliffs, of fighting an army, disarming a bomb at the last second...but no, they're just chatting in an office.

Which recent movies? "The Bible" wasn't a movie, it's a tv series (5 episodes, two hours each) that originally aired on the History Channel in 2013. Most recent movies in general probably don't have much staying power.

Have you read the OP? The films made by those film makers are the ones I specifically meant. Then other junk like God's Not Dead, Heaven Is For Real, and A Matter of Faith and whatever else came out in the past two years. It is so unfortunate that "faith-based" filmmakers insist on preaching to the audience rather than trying making an actual compelling film that touches on religious themes. It's certainly doable; there have been plenty of them before.

As I told you before in another thread, there are individuals who accept the possibility of both. Rather than choosing creationism instead of science or vice-versa, some of us decide to consider the option that the universe is comprised of matter and energy which changes over time in the form of star formation and biospheric evolution among other things while being made by a divine creator.

On-topic: If anything, this is good for the diversity in cinema. Hollywood has a habit of making certain kinds of films and the same is true about Hong Kong and Bollywood.

That sounds like science to me.

@Aljosa23: It does, so see edit.

I wasn't sure if you were referring to the movies mentioned in the OP, or to the "The Bible Series" and "The Son of God" which I mentioned in my post. The cool thing about Ben-Hur is that it's an original story (based on the book "Ben-Hur: A Tale of The Christ"), that happens in a Biblical setting. Ben-Hur is a classic, it airs on tv every year around Easter.

As far as the recent movies like "God's Not Dead" or "Heaven is For Real", I haven't seen them, so I can't really say if they are good or not.

lol.. these movies seem to try to perpetrate the myth that college is nothing but elitist liberal brain washing institutions.... good thing the freedom loving protagonist can stand up to the tyranny!

I want to see God's Not Dead or Heaven is for Real but I haven't gotten around to it. I'm also looking forward to seeing what they do with Left Behind. The one with Kirk Cameron was okay but didn't really follow the book. And then the second and third movies followed the books less and less. When you base a movie on a book you should keep it closer to the book. That's why I refuse to see Noah.

what happened in Noah (that you've heard) was different from the story in the Bible?

I mean I've heard some bitching that too many people died in it, but that was fox news and yeah the world was flooded in that story so of course there is going to be lots of death.

The main issue I have with the movie is that the plot was that the flood was caused by sins against nature, which isn't what it's supposed to be about. The story in the Bible was about sins against God. In fact, I even heard God wasn't mentioned once in the movie. If it's a Christian movie (which Noah IMO doesn't count as one), God should be somewhere in the script. Also, I heard that in the movie Noah's sons were children, while in the Bible they were adult married men. There were other issues I had heard but don't remember what they were. However, those are the issues that are keeping me from watching it.

Anyway, I hadn't heard anything about people bitching that there were two many deaths. If this is true then that's just idiotic. Most sane people know anytime you have an apocalypse there are millions of deaths, so that part of the movie/story at least makes sense.

EDIT: I'd say Evan Almighty was more of a Christian movie than Noah, and Evan Almighty isn't considered one while Noah is.

And you seem to have made up your own definition of creationism. Creationism != Belief in god.

Creationism is the belief that the universe was created as is. i.e no evolution.

@The-Apostle: From a film perspective I could see where a father doing what he can to keep his wife and children safe is more compelling than trying to save adults who should be able to look after themselves. Not mentioning God in biblical story? Yeah that's harder to defend.

Actually though on a side note, much like Job, the story of Noah is one of the more difficult stories to tackle. I mean God condemns everyone in the world (with the exception of Noah's family) to die because they are "all" so very sinful. I get that God is an all-knowing all-powerful being, but that is getting pretty fucking harsh with the world of punishments at his disposal to choose from.

I just watched the trailer for God's Not Dead. Yeah I really hate that lie the most. It's bad enough that these are shameless exploitation films, but to try to use them to instill both lies and hatred/mistrust of higher education is really disgusting to me.