Amen.
Paying $12 when I can wait for the $3 DVD is a better deal. The popcorn is better too.
t'ain't the fault of christians that the movie biz sucks.
Oddly enough, most of the people going to the movies on Saturday ARE Christians, if the statistics on Christianity in the USA are correct.
Or does this article refer to some "special" Christians or something?
I'm only going to movies if they are good. I'm not going to go to a bad movie to make a political point.
If people need movies to reinforce their identity as a Christian they have bigger problems than Hollywood.
Besides, The Passion of the Christ was not the brainchild of mainstream Hollywood anyway.
Eisner may have said that he was in it for Disney to make money, but in Medved's book several years ago he specifically asked Hollywood producers if the financial successes of G and PG rated films would inspire them to make more such movies. The answer was "(*$^#! No!" and that they would never consider making money a priority over making propaganda to effect viewers (for the worse).
This sounds like a good idea but how is anyone to know what is a good movie? My wife, a big fan of Tom Hanks, found "Ladykillers" and looked forward to another excellent Hanks movie. She was assaulted by language she never expected in a Hanks movie and although she fought her way through that offensive part, the same language was present through the entire movie. Who would have expected that in a Tom Hanks film? If we found that after we had bought our ticket, it would still be counted as a box office success. Nobody counts the number of people who walk out.
"If Christians would go as a demographic bloc to a movie on opening weekend, we could make that movie a hit. And the studios would make more films just like it"
Um, anyone seen "The Passion II?"
Me neither.
Gibson's Passion was one of the biggest blockbusters in history and nothing followed.
Hollywood sets the tone and promotes its ideology.
In 1992, they took a total box office flop called The Crying Game and turned it into a modest success by nominating it for six Oscars and relentlessly marketing it as a nominated, must-see film. It was poorly-scripted, boring sodomy propaganda with a "secret twist" and would have died a deserved box office death if not for a promotional budget several times its filming cost.
In 1993 Philadelphia was another propaganda movie with all the stops pulled out on its marketing as an Oscar-nominated film.
Hollywood is more than capable of losing money in order to artificially create an audience for a film that wouldn't normally succeed.
In 1999 it was Boys Don't Cry.
The latest push will be for Brokeback Mountain.
I do not care whether the image making enterprises in Hollywood or elsewhere thrive or shrivel, or see value in making some special effort to exert "Christian Influence" on them, per se. If they fail to produce material of interest and value to me, they can seek customers elsewhere.
90+% of cinematic products are forgettable, and not even amusing in the initial viewing, so the main value of "teaser ads" is getting an immediate sense of which titles are obviously "must miss" productions. Maybe one out of three or four of the "highly recommended by usually reliable reviewers" are satisfactory to some degree. I prefer to wait until an offering has been in circulation for a few years, and then select some of the survivors that were recommended by reviewers with compatible tastes, who also offered some discussion explaining what value, if any, they obtained by their viewing time investment.
So in the last five years, I've considered 'well spent' the time invested in viewing and discussing the Lord of the Ring series, Mel Gibson's "Passion", Robert Duvall's "Tender Mercies" and "The Apostle", the original "Matrix", "Thirteenth Floor", and "Dark City. Several other films were modestly interesting, but still were "dry holes" as worthwhile investments of time.
This is a false premise. Only one of the top 20 all time grossing movies has an R rating, and that one was The Passion of the Christ. In response Hollywood creates a vastly disproportionate percentage of R rated movies.
I thought we were by not going.
But I think a reason that floats beneath the radar is the fact that there are more old Americans now than young Americans, and the US population (legal citizens) did not replace itself.
Ironic that Hollywood, so passionate about exterminating the unborn, aborted itself out of business.
I highly recommend "The Greatest Game Ever Played," which is based on a true story that happened in the early 1900's. I saw it about a month ago when it came out, but I guess it wasn't that successful at the box office. Too bad families didn't take their kids and support a nice movie. If we don't support movies like this, they won't get made.
http://disney.go.com/disneypictures/greatestgame/
No moral obligation ever existed for Mr. Eisner's ilk. The only way I believe we can force those who run most of Hollywood to begin producing artful movies that make a moral statement is to stop going altogther, until they get it right. Or at the very least, attend only those very few movies worth watching.
If Hollywood and the boob tube produced decent movies and programs, with some basic Chrisitan morals and values, crime amongst our young people would drop off sharply. Hollywood glorifies the behavior of punks, which breeds more punks. I believe they know full-well that their 'product' is a cancer on American culture.
No. Time and again, family friendly movies have made piles of money. But they still produce anti-family crap. They're not interested in money.
Even Zarutha had a few lines that made me cringe: "Fetch me a juice box, be-otch."