Comments on: “Fireproof” Beats Out “Religulous”

By: Paul Hameline

Paul Hameline — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 11:34:47 +0000

I rallied a bunch of friends to go to Fire Proof, only my Christian friends came…they all loved the movie; I loved the message but watching it was painful in terms of the pace, the production value, the acting…you get the point. I’m glad my unsaved friends didn’t come, I’d rather evangelize to them myself. My wife made a good point, “it seems like the film was made for Christians.” I hope we, as Christians” can bring excellence in production value to the big screen….we have the greatest writer in the business!

By: Stan O

Stan O — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 17:03:07 +0000

It was an ok movie with a great message. Honestly, it was maybe a step or two above the best of the Billy Graham movies of the 70’s as far as production quality.

Hopefully, they won’t stop improving. Personally, I think we need to be careful about the story being a slave to the message, it makes it feel like propaganda. Hopefully we can get to Francis Schaeffer’s “Good art with a good message”.

By: Leslie I T Assih

Leslie I T Assih — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 15:31:49 +0000

But I am happy there is a debate on this movie whether some Christians hate it and some love it – people are definitely noticing and in that comes the questions and curiosity from those who have not seen it whether Christians or not and that is a good thing. One thing is for sure I would love to be in the shoes of the Kendrick Brothers enjoying near global success in the movie business with just three movies within just three years!!! PHENOMENAL!!!!!!!!

By: Leslie I T Assih

Leslie I T Assih — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 15:10:25 +0000

Well done Tom for the article reference. I actually enjoyed reading the comments more than the article itself. If only Christians were locusts when it comes to a common cause regarding the Gospel? But for now I truly appreciate the concerted efforts of the Kendrick Brothers and their church Sherwood Baptist in the media. I will support them and I will encourage other Christians to do so no matter their tastes in regards to film.

By: Tom Swift

Tom Swift — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 12:33:12 +0000

Is it a step up for films with a Christian message, or is it a step down? – This is an interesting article from World Magazine on wondering if Christians have lowered the bar in their critique of the film:

http://online.worldmag.com/2008/10/07/fireproof-shouldnt-be-critic-proof/

By: A G Burnett

A G Burnett — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 16:28:58 +0000

Christians ARE the dominant religious group in this country, and they DO vote with their wallets. I would wager that a large portion of the people who paid to see “Knocked Up” or “Batman” show up to church at least once a week. These are people who will go to see an expressly Christian movie for the same reason anyone goes to see any hollywood movie – marketing, stars, and production value. We know that they will come to the theatre, and pay $10 to see films with a message if they have some kind of cache behind them: Passion, Evan Almighty, the Nativity Story, One Night with the King. All these films had multi-million dollar box office receipts that make the two week totals for Fireproof look like lunch money. The problem is that these films have watered down to the Christian message so much that its hard to relate to the characters as anything besides, well, characters in a movie. They have little relativity to the modern day lives of people of faith.

Now I dont want to belie what FP has done. The Kendricks continue to make films that speak to us today and are not afraid to praise Jesus on the silver screen, something which scares studio producers to death. Hopefully those FP per-screen averages will help them get over that fear. The key is to marry the Kendricks’ dedication to Christ centered narratives with a real production budget, and more importantly, a real marketing budget. I believe that with their latest effort, they have brought us several steps closer to this eventuality.

If the Kendrick’s (or anyone) applied this formula, I believe they would have tremendous returns at the BO. If that’s what’s important to them.

By: Leslie I T Assih

Leslie I T Assih — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 13:57:54 +0000

In terms of the film’s financial success of Fireproof, the film-makers will only further up the ante and drive the field of excellence in terms of technical ability (which is one of the reasons why many ‘elite’ Christians will not see this movie – at the same time these same ‘elite’ Christians will consume the Hollywood movies that offer nothing eternally lasting for the most part)but the argument has been that storytelling is not real enough or emotionally gritty and does not contain enough character depth to produce multi-dimensional characters. That said I am much more concerned that they do not lose, diminish and negate the spiritual responsibility they have towards the Lord and His people and those He wants to reach out to through their films. I really want them to never forget their ‘first love’ to the Lord and that they will continue to excel spiritually as well as technically in terms of storytelling, production, post-production and business & marketing of their movies. Their movies touch the heart and I have seen that firsthand like no other movie has done – especially when we watched the movie Facing The Giants with some children who were not Christians!