That’s the title of an article written recently by Dallas Jenkins, a friend and filmmaker. He makes great points like:
What movie do you think Jesus would go see this weekend? There are lots of choices right now, and an interesting collision of films, there are four films with strongly spiritual themes playing. FOUR! Can you believe it?
Would Jesus watch To Save a Life, The Blind Side, The Book of Eli, or Legion, or none of the above? All four of those films have a combination of several of the following:
It’s like “The Perfect Storm” of films with spiritual themes. Which one do you think Jesus would enjoy the most? Would he even attend one of those, or would he go into films with dark, troubling themes to sit next to people who are wondering if the darkness portrayed on the screen, and the darkness they’re experiencing in their lives, is all there is to life?
Would He laugh at the jokes, appreciate the martial arts displays, and cry at the sad scenes? I wonder. What do you think?
Today is a great day for the nation of Haiti. People around the world are pouring out their compassion through money, resources and people.
Filmmakers are no different. Tonight, George Clooney hosts a telethon called “Hope for Haiti Now.” Tons of performers will join him and the show will be aired on several networks.
Yesterday, brothers Bobby and Kevin Downes helped orchestrate the rescue of 80 Haitian orphans and united them with their families in Miami, Florida.
Tomorrow, David deVos heads to Haiti with a medical missions team from his church.
What are others doing to help with relief efforts?
Read the full story about these men’s efforts on our website.
80 children from God’s Littlest Angels Orphanage in Haiti will be united with their new parents in Miami, Florida, this evening (Thursday, January 21).
Filmmakers Kevin and Bobby Downes (The Moment After 1 & 2, Mercy Streets), whose latest film Like Dandelion Dust had several scenes set in Haiti, worked with the orphanage director to arrange flights to get the children out of Haiti and into the United States.
After Secretary Janet Napolitano announced a humanitarian parole policy for Haitian orphans, the brothers went to work and did what they do best - managed logistics, assets and people to create magic. Today’s magic is getting “The Haiti 80″ to their parents.
Why the Downes brothers? Because Kevin and his wife Catherine have been waiting for two years to meet their new son Benjamin, who will be on this evening’s plane.
From our friends at Christian Contest: Enter the Christian Contest video contest.
The criterion is to make an appropriate video commercial to help promote Christian Contest.
Upload the video to your YouTube or Tangle account and send the link to info@christiancontest.com and put Video Entry in the subject line. Videos can be a straight up commercial, a comedy, action, let your creative muse go. They will pick the top 15 or so videos and then send them to a panel of 11 or so judges to pick the top three videos.Prizes:
Entries give Christian Contest the right to post links or embed videos to their videos on websites, emails, blogs, and other digital promotional tools. Entries certify they have rights to all images and music, and permission from actors to use their skills, image, and abilities. Prize is only available to the person who entered. If you won you’ll be notified by email, at which time you will need to provide an address for the prize check. Entries must be received by March 5, 2010
Yesterday afternoon I broke down and went to see Avatar. I have been going back and forth about seeing it, and decided to accompany a friend to a matinee. I’m really glad I didn’t pay full evening price PLUS the cost of 3-D glasses.
I tried to like the film, really I did. I thought the special effects were amazing and the 3-D was effective for the most part. But when I see a movie, I want to see
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Perhaps the great success of James Cameron’s film Avatar is that he unwittingly emphasizes our need for God and relationship with Him.
A recent article on CNN’s Entertainment website highlights an unexpected phenomenon associated with the movie Avatar: Fans who long for the alien world Pandora feel depressed and suicidal because it’s unattainable. According to fans of the film, compared with life on Earth, Pandora is a beautiful, glowing utopia.
But It’s Not Real
The problem with that is Pandora is an entirely fictional place. It’s not just out of reach, it’s non-existent. So why are so people so obsessed with it? Fans commenting on an online forum say Pandora seems to be a perfect place, a pristine world where there is synergy between all of the characters. In their words, it’s a world with “something we don’t have here on Earth.”
But we did have a pristine world once. There was a place where man and God walked together in perfect harmony. Then man sinned, and as a result,
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Denzel Washington, one of Hollywood’s most successful and highly respected figures, stars in The Book of Eli, the story of a man of faith on a mission to protect the last copy of the Bible. America has suffered a catastrophic destruction and civilization and law have disappeared. Described as “a warrior by necessity,” Eli seeks peace. But if the book he carries, the hope for the future, is challenged, he will protect it fiercely. He’s a man who does what he must to survive and continue on his mission.
The film is rated R and contains graphic violence and language, causing many who are Christians to wonder why a man with such public faith would take a role
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I know it’s kind of an oxymoron to mention “seeing” and “Blind Side” in the same sentence, but when it refers to the blockbuster Sandra Bullock movie, it all makes sense. This weekend, she made box office history with her role in The Blind Side. The film passed the $200 million mark (its running total is now $208.5 million), which is a record for a female-led film at the United States box office.
What does that mean? I’m not the only one asking that question. Hollywood bloggers are analyzing the surprising success.
Well, for one thing, it means a woman can carry a blockbuster film. Not to downplay the effect of having Tim McGraw in the film (read my interview with him - and in case you’re wondering, yes, he really is nice in person!), but the film itself is really about powerhouse Leigh Anne Tuohy. It also means that sports-themed movies can be very successful.
Another important aspect of the movie’s success -
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I heard a few people this weekend make the comment that they were “people of faith,” not “religious” or “spiritual” people. What does that mean? I’m a “person of faith,” and you better believe it’s faith in God.Who else, or what else, is there to have faith in? Other people? No. They’ll let me down, just like I let them down. Systems of government? No - we’ve all seen how well that works - no matter who you voted for, who you plan to vote for, or who you think might have the best answers to your questions.Personally, I think that statement is a cop-out. I think it means, “I want people to think I’m a spiritual person, but I don’t want to have to commit to something as serious as God because I don’t understand Him.”I think the movie Faith Like Potatoes has a good analogy for faith. It’s something that’s hidden, under the surface, growing, but you don’t know how strong it is until you need it. But be careful when you watch the film, because you’re going to have to make a choice about what you’re putting faith into, and it’s not some amorphous something you don’t have to commit to. Nope. Watching Faith Like Potatoes could be dangerous to your state of spiritual health. Enjoy.
This morning my hometown, Houston, Texas, woke up to snow. Not just little flakes floating lazily through the air, but what could end up as a 5-inch accumulation. For those of you living near frozen tundra, that may seem inconsequential. For a city that’s 45 miles from the Gulf of Mexico, it might as well be a blizzard.
Global warming, indeed. And now news is starting to surface about “creative data manipulation” and data that’s been undisclosed that doesn’t support the theories of global warming.
I watched an excellent documentary called Nobelity, in which filmmaker Turk Pipkin questions Nobel prize winners about what they see as the most pressing issues facing the world. It’s fascinating to hear the greatest minds in the world
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Earlier today I received an email from Marti, who was wondering how to know what films to buy? She had a pretty specific idea of what kinds of films she liked, but found that the last few films she purchased from her last bookstore weren’t exactly what she wanted.
Last night, I had a conversation with some friends about the very same thing, but with books. They look good on the outside, you even think some of the quotes are great. But how do you really know until you get home and start to read or watch it?
Here’s where the beauty of the ChristianCinema.com DVD rental club comes in. You don’t have to buy the films before watching them. If you don’t like the film, you can stop it, put it in the envelope and return it. But if you like it, then the next time you go to the website you can buy it.
Too bad you can’t “rent” a ticket for theatrical releases. Hmm…maybe that will be my next business venture!
It’s the day before Thanksgiving and I’m in a mellow mood looking forward to an extra long weekend. I have a copy of The Mysterious Islands on my desk and decided to pop it into my DVD player. I heard about it a few weeks ago from my friend Jon Erwin, who directed and co-write the film.
From the moment the DVD started playing, the beautiful photography and music captured my attention. And then as it started playing, it just got better. I’ve been blessed to travel around the world and have seen some incredible scenery. There are times that the majesty of God’s creation takes my breath away, and what these men captured on their journey to the Galapagos Islands did that.
They film incredible creatures in their habitats, and
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I think it’s important to give notice when you leave a job. When I left my previous job to come to ChristianCinema.com, I gave my employers there 30 days’ notice. Our pastor recently left our church; he gave 60 days’ notice.
Oprah, the queen of daytime television, has us all beat. She gave 18 months’ notice that she’s ending her 25-year talk reign. She’s ending it in September, 2011. Why do I need to know that now?
She is a woman of great influence and has inspired many people to do a lot of things,
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Last night during their Sunday evening service Sherwood Baptist (home of Sherwood Pictures) announced their next film title and theme. The leadership team of Senior Pastor Michael Catt, Executive Pastor Jim McBride, and Media Pastors Alex Kendrick and Stephen Kendrick all stood on the platform to make the announcement.
Who would you want to see in this film?
The makers of Flywheel, Facing the Giants and Fireproof are taking a departure from their previous movies. This film title starts with a C: Courageous. It’s about fatherhood, and the main characters are four fathers who are all in law enforcement. As Pastor Catt said,it echoes God’s call for men to “rise with courage” in their homes and as leaders. They expect to begin filming in March of 2010.
I wonder if they’ll have any guest actors (like Kirk Cameron in Fireproof), and
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If you have any reason to reach customers in the Christian market (bookstore owner, website operator, pastor, leader of a non-profit organization, etc.), you should have a well-worn, oft-read copy of Faith-Based Marketing in your library. But don’t put it on a shelf. Keep it on your desk because you’ll go back to it again and again.SynopsisWith a combined 30+ years of experience in the faith based marketing arena, Bob Hutchins and Greg Stielstra teamed to create an innovative manual to help business people understand and reach this untapped segment. A nationally recognized expert in the area of creative marketing strategies, Hutchins was the creator of online marketing campaigns for the hit movies The Passion of the Christ and The Chronicles of Narnia, while Stielstra directed the marketing for Rick Warren’s bestseller The Purpose Driven Life, which has sold more than 30 million copies.In Faith-Based Marketing, Hutchins and Stielstra provide helpful resources to build a better relationship between business and believers by helping them truly understand and respect each other. The book provides everything business leaders need to understand
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With 30+ years of marketing experience between them, Greg Stielstra and Bob Hutchins know the Christian audience. They know it’s not a huge analogous blob just waiting for the next Passion of the Christ film to appear in theaters. Their experience in music, film, and book marketing helped them understand the many facets of the Christian market, and from that understanding they wrote Faith-Based Marketing, which should be a textbook for anyone trying to reach Christian consumers.
The Christian market is the world’s largest niche.
I began my conversation with them with an apology.
When I received the review copy of the book, my preconceived notion was that it was going to be a treatise on how to do “grassroots” marketing campaigns to get Christians to attend films, or buy books and gifts, etc., en masse. I was wrong.
Greg: We kind of tipped it around, didn’t we? It’s a discussion about how any business can speak effectively to Christians, and we’re really speaking more to the WalMarts and General Motors of this world.
Exactly! I thought it was very interesting because the perspective I hear in the film business is that Christians are an underserved market. But it’s not that they’re underserved in terms of needing more products, but that they need to be reached in a different way. Why write the book, and what kind of response have you gotten so far?
Bob: For me, it’s something that’s been in the back of my head now for a few years. Greg and I were business acquaintances while he was at Zondervan and
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I spent a few minutes on the phone the other day with Jeff Martin, executive producer of Lord, Save Us From Your Followers. They had a great run with a limited theatrical release, and are seeing a tremendous response at church screenings, and are now deciding what next steps to take.
We’ve talked about marketing before on this blog (here, here, and here), and looked at some great examples of grass-roots campaigns that got audiences into theaters by droves.
The challenge I see is that each film is unique and appeals in a unique way to a unique audience. There are basic questions you have to ask and answer in order to create your campaign. Some of those are:
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In two weeks The Blind Side, a powerful film based on a true story, is coming to theaters near you. It hits so many perfect notes in all the right places that it is sure to win audiences around the country.
You’ve probably already seen the trailers, and perhaps, like me, you wonder if all the movie is shown in the trailer? Trust me, it’s not.
Sandra Bullock, who is one of my favorite actresses (While You Were Sleeping, Miss Congeniality, Hope Floats), teams with country music superstar Tim McGraw (Flicka), who is just about as nice as a person can be, to bring this story to life. You’ll be blown away by the performances of Quinton Aaron, Jae Head, and Lily Collins.
Watch the ChristianCinema.com website, because I’ll be publishing articles about the film there in the next couple of weeks. It’s a great film you’re not going to want to miss. See you at the movies!
Dandy-like and dandified is how Charles Marshall (I’m Just Sayin’!, from Crown Comedy) describes himself the day we talk. He’s not dandelion-like, because that’s two levels above, where you’re almost insane, at least by his rating system. He’s feeling pretty good about life and before a minute has passed, he’s making cracks about the time of day, as well as Fresno, California.
I have two passions professionally: laughter and encouragement.
Before I could even ask the first question, he spent five minutes interviewing me about where I came from, how I wound up in California, and the difference between accents in the metropolitan areas of the South vs. accents of those who live in the country. It’s because he’s interested in other people and learning their stories. As Charles says, “I already know what’s going on with me, so I like asking questions.” He graciously took a step back and allowed me to start asking him questions eventually.
In addition to being a comedian, Charles is a creative problem-solver. When I explained that some of my interview recordings have sounds of interference after about 15 minutes, he asked if I ever considered that maybe after 15 minutes,
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