Holy Week was the easy half. Churches already had a slot, Angel already had the list, and an animated Christ story does not require a content warning in most of the rooms that booked it. The test was August. August is when family films either become catalog or become a habit.
Exhibitors in the South and Midwest described a second audience that did not look like the opening-week church groups. These were repeat households: a kid who liked the animals, an adult who liked that the movie did not wink. That is how a faith title becomes a birthday-party movie instead of a liturgical one.
4 min read
