Jedi To Jesus
The Making of a
Christian Filmmaker
a personal testimony and commentary
by Cory Parella
Smashwords Edition
published by Miracle Pictures Studios of Denver, Colorado
Copyright
2012 Cory Parella
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Section B. Sex: Do Not Call God’s Creation Dirty
Forward
by
Rev. John C. Ottinger,
Grace To The Nations Church Tucson,
Arizona
The material in this book is some of the most important and controversial you can dare to tackle. Cory Parella has devoted his life, thus far, to pulling back the veil on popular media and movies, and the myriad of ways it is produced, sold and consumed; yes, consumed. Much of the concepts behind why filmmakers make films, and the compromises they are willing to accept in order to make them, will be disturbing to discover herein.
Popular media does more to condition the mindset of the average American than any other means of information distribution; yes, even the internet, such that the internet is often times just regurgitating the content in movies, TV and video games. That being said, the media can either destroy the fabric of decency and morality, or build it to new heights, the tone of which is set simply by how it’s produced and used.
All aspects of the human condition and the spiritual walk are within its scope, and much too often the reason for their decline. Responsible Christians need to take back "the movies", as we should all forms of media, stop being its victims and start being its creators and masters. To this end we have to dispel the myths associated with many “taboo” subjects.
Cory has done more research this facet of popular culture, as it relates to film creation, than any other person I have ever met. He loves the Lord with all his might, such that I join him in offering this challenge to you, as he offered it to me. “Research it,” with love and a critical mind, and “research the material and be willing to discuses it.” I say, “Shame on the person who believes what they read without checking it against the Word of God.” (Acts 17:11) Don’t just go with what you think you know. Really check it out.
Be blessed and be challenged.
Pastor John Ottinger,
January 13, 2010
Tucson, Arizona
There will be a day when life as we know it will end.
Jesus makes this very clear, using marriage as an example. Brides will be shopping for their wedding days. The world will be going about its day. Filmmakers will be ongoing in the filmmaking process. And then, He’ll appear in the sky, for the whole world to see. Game over, and no time to quickly say we pledge allegiance to the winning side.
Those who Know Him already will rejoice; those who do not will dread that moment. Between the day I write these words and that day, followers of Christ, referred to hereafter as “Believers”, have this command, known as the Great Commission, which states, Make disciples of all nations and baptize them in the Name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
Language barriers have always been a factor in doing that, and will continue to be until language is a non-issue in global communication.
In fact, if Jesus waits another few centuries or another thousand years for His return, these very words will require a translator to the people of 3010, just as William Shakespeare’s words do in my lifetime.
Cinema as we know it in 2010 has the power to overcome those barriers, so that current and future generations can learn about the character of God through the Word. Cinema offers a tool of clarification, an immunity to language barriers and a concordance for cultural differences.
Whether certain stories are being told in the Ukraine or the U.S. State of Wisconsin, Israel, as it was during King David’s lifetime as recorded in Kings, remains unchanged in the Word, and regions in the Middle East remain today as they were then, used as settings for dramatic reenactments, bringing the printed pages to life with actors and ambiance.
E-books now include videos, so that readers may not distinguish between the Word as recorded by letter-by-letter alphabet, from visuals created by way of animation or dramatic art.
Passages, such as how Judas killed himself, become very clear when we are able to see the location for ourselves, and typically respond, “Now I understand.” Once we understand, we are more likely to believe.
God does not need us to make movies to accomplish this; He knows how to speak to any people without Man’s involvement, so know that our role is that of a servant, one of privilege. Anyone who loses sight of that can expect to be humbled. During the early portion of my life, (I am thirty-six years old as I write this), I have witnessed The Call, resulting in evangelists, in the form of performers, writers, producers, etc., sent to the cities where cinema has been a dominant industry, and they have made a significant impact.
Those cities have included Los Angles, where Hollywood is located, New York City, Chicago, Miami, Dallas, Seattle, Toronto, Tucson, and more. The Call has also been to those who are to break new ground in places where His Word is to be the Foundation for movie making, which Called me to Denver, Colorado. It’s safe to say there is no single place of gathering, the Lord distribution His forces globally.
During a time when the mainstream industry has looked down on Christianity in the filmmaking process, God Called me to a place where the industry had been at a standstill, where it would be reset in His Image.
In Denver, there is no opposition to His movement that has any influence or political power, and submission to Him is a prerequisite, as opposed to Los Angeles, where the burying of one’s faith in the face of winning or losing a job is encouraged. If only the Bible had a place of respect in the movie industry...
“In the beginning”, it did.
In the beginning of the cinema profession, that is the way it was. Producer Cecil DeMille became famous by using the Bible as source material. Storytelling changed over the first century (late 19th/20th-centuries) to the point where shock value became more profitable than plot, and it took filmmakers a while to realize just what they had in the Bible. Later on in this book I discuss the impact that a film called The Passion of The Christ (2004) had on the world. It was one film.
The Call could reap a harvest of thousands of this magnitude by the time Jesus does return, but Believers must respond with determination, downplaying their faith for no one; showing respect to others of different beliefs, without being cowards about sharing their own. And between this day and then, it is our role to constantly improve the product of our creative worship so that each future generation can look back on what we did and see only Him. Remember, our servanthood is a thankless role before Man. If you expect or demand to win Man’s awards for your work, such as the Oscar, Golden Globe, Emmy, Ace, MTV Music Video, Spirit, or Whatever Award; if the sound of your name followed by the sound of thunderous applause is your prerequisite for this role; if a huge financial pay off is the only or main goal in your heart, you will fail. Marketing will produce enough of a harvest to compensate us, but our reward awaits us at His feet. Anything less than our best effort is unacceptable.
Cory Parella
February 24, 2011
Denver, Colorado
1. Why This Book Is Called...
This book is not a product licensed by Lucasfilm Ltd. It is recommended for ages 12 and up.
This book is for anyone, Christian or not, who wants to make, invest in or understand the genre of Christian films. There is a difference between a “worship” film, and a film that is labeled as a “Christian” film for the purposes of marketing.
The audience that will pay to see stories that use the Bible as a source or frame of reference is the largest audience in the democratic world. The Bible remains the publishing world’s bestseller, and is revered by followers of Jesus Christ as being a supernatural promissory note from God.
The genre of sexually explicit media is also addressed, sharing the common denominator of shock value with Christian media. To the world, the Christian message, known as the Gospel, is shocking. To the Christian faith, and other religions, sexual explicitly is shocking.
“Jedi To Jesus” is a transitional autobiography. “The Making of a Christian Filmmaker” describes the character and business model for Christian filmmakers. In that regard, it is both a personal testimony and a technical manual that leans on the Bible throughout.
The dedications on the cover art are derived from historical events that occurred during the months I started writing it. A youth event called See You At The Pole was happening about the same time as a shooter entered a church in Fort Worth, Texas and open-fired on a primarily teenage crowd.
On April 20th, 1999, the deadliest shooting at a high school in United States history happened in Littleton, Colorado. In the days that followed, and the years that followed those days, theories, facts and hearsay distorted the historical record.
This is not a history book, but if this lone sentence becomes your sole source for learning what the F.B.I. learned after many interviews with the shooters’ parents and all the evidence gathered from that day, the culprit was mental illness, and another boy who followed a mentally ill kid to his death.
Since an entire region of the world followed Adolph Hitler blindly for more than a decade, a German dictator who was clinically insane and addicted to drugs at the time the Allied Forces landed in Europe, we know that people will do such things are the ‘right’ conditions.
Performers such as Marilyn Mason, Marshal Mathers, (stage name “Eminem”) and others, were the targets of blame on April 21st, 1999. Many Church leaders used this as a rallying cry to reinsert prayer back into public schools.
An Oscar-winning documentary by Michael Moore was released a couple years later explaining why the previous effort to do that in the 1980’s had failed.
Mr. Manson went on to battle drug addiction and bankruptcy. Marshal realized the positive things in life when Christians in the entertainment world embraced him, overcoming a battle with drugs and embracing parenthood.
In that maze of commercialism and politics, the object of this book was to catch the eye of those hypnotized by the works of Stan Lee, George Lucas, Gene Roddenberry, and more, with a title-and-cover that at-first-glance, made-ya-laugh, and upon opening and reading, made-ya-choose.
Joshua 24:14
“But if serving the LORD seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your ancestors served beyond the Euphrates, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.”
I have read countless of online comments mocking the title,while at the same time being in agreement that there needs to be a tool that both defines the genre and addresses a strategy for engaging in it.
Sure, at times I get emotional over the immaturity I read by way of blogger cheap shots, who would describe the largest commercial demographic in the democratic world as small.
Since they are the very people Christ died for, I can’t blame the sick for being sick. I hope many of them have moved out of their parents homes since then.
This book is really for those who seek a compass in the balance of cinematic and cyber storytelling, and their faith as they receive the Call.
No matter how we label it, the impact that entertainment has on its audience is not only undeniable, the makers count on it for sales and repeat business.
Entertainment, whether spiritualtainment, edutainment, or anyothertainment, is a drug. It causes a chemical reaction in the brain, and can cause addictive behavior. Anything can if the context of moderation is lost.
The Holy Spirit, co-owner-operators in the hearts of Believers, tells us when we have had enough.
As for me, why did I set out to write it?
At age 25, I could recite the Star Wars Trilogy (1977-1883) in 45 minutes flat, and did not know what the Ten Commandments were. My life was a wreck. I knew I needed a change, but from what to what?
A little personal history.
I was born into a working class family who had some ties to the A-list movie industry.
My dad’s police job landed him on the Old Tucson Studios sound stages of Michael Landon’s Little House On The Prairie and Father Murphy, among other films such as Revenge Of The Nerds, and Desert Bloom, able to meet, observe the work of and nearly work with his teen idol, “little Joe” (my dad’s first name), Mr. Landon, the role which inspired my dad, a fan of Bonanza to move west in 1971.
My aunt’s cousin married New York director Jonathan Demme in the late 1980’s. Steven Spielberg’s family lived in Tucson and Phoenix during the same time. It was often said that some of the film’s planet Tatooine shots in Star Wars were based on photos taken of Tucson-based Arizona sunsets.
Many scenes of the original trilogy were filmed in Arizona. Actor-director Sean Penn’s dad was a contractor director for Landon, gaining Sean his first role in the 1970’s. His youngest brother was in my high school physical education class – completely under the radar.
The first film I saw was Star Wars, and as it impacted most of my generation in some way, I got my first connection with how I understood God from Luke’s flight through the Death Star, Obi-Wan’s voice guiding him from the afterlife. To me, this explained how God was speaking to me, later articulated in the Bible as the Holy Spirit.
There came a point where I realized that I had developed an unhealthy obsession with George Lucas’ movie, and I did not know what the 10 Commandments were.
In January of 1998, I started attended a church in my hometown, after several years in the entertainment industry. I spent 3 years learning how to read a Bible. The people were flawed, and single men, a demographic to which I belonged, were condemned for their unmarried status.
Nonetheless, I knew I was there for a reason. When the tragedy at Columbine High School happened on April 20, 1999, whereby a dozen people were murdered, it struck a cord in me that prompted me to jump onto the blame-them bandwagon, and early drafts of this book were industrial accusations of popular artists’ lack of accountability of their creative works’ impact on culture, along with a play-by-play diary of the social atmosphere at Grace Chapel of Tucson.
This became reduced to a rant about people who have since then left, changed or died, and I shelved the book for years.
The graphic used as the book cover became the target of ridicule among some of the online ignorant, until I realized what it needed to be: a forensic of how the movie industries operated, with a focus on defining and raising the standard for gospel media.
Billy Graham filled football stadiums when he preached. The audience is there. Mel Gibson verified it.
Books on how to write movie scripts for the purpose of selling them were common, but no one had put all the information in the same place and narrowed in on the Christian genre. If a pornographer wanted to change genres or professions, how would they do it?
It’s not enough to say, “Repent!”
How?
I wanted to create a testimonial, and an industrial blueprint of what Christian filmmaking should be.
I knew that if wrapped in a Star Wars-looking cover, people would read it, especially my intended audience: filmmakers. Even those who didn’t like Star Wars are forced to recognize the industrial innovations caused by its success.
Though I was advised by a few ignorant people that the Star Wars aspect would become tired and outdated, the 2009 film Fanboys, and the 40 thousand fans,and their kids, dressed in costume at the annual Star Wars Convention at Staples Center dispelled that theory.
In addition, over time I would learn that in regards to what made the boys known for shooting a dozen classmates and teachers on April 20th, 1999, after the smoke and dust of accusations of pop singers, video games, music, movies, and more had settled, and after the parents of the shooters had been thoroughly interviewed, one could only conclude that one of the boys was under-medicated, suffering from deep depression, and the other followed him blindly.
A third boy had planned to join them, but at the last moment, didn’t.
In 2009, the mother of Dylan Klebold released a journal describing her own experiences since that fateful day when her suicidal and depressed son said goodbye to her one last time, to take a dozen lives before he took his own. Now a parent myself, I pray I never have to experience such a surreal horror.
A decade later, here’s what we learned. It wasn’t the media, it wasn’t a particular pop star, nor the influence of a cult leader nor drugs that caused the murders at Columbine High School or the other incidents that occurred thereafter, tied to it by the media. It wasn’t fashion-related.
It wasn’t secular or religious leaders dropping the ball, even though at times, yes, we do. The kid was just suffering from deep depression, and was under-diagnosed. But all these possibilities did bring up a good point.
How much did pop culture and all its media attributes affect us, from birth until death?
For weeks after the tragedy at Columbine High School, I sat in Grace Chapel, a Foursquare Church in Tucson, Arizona, and listened to sermon after sermon condemn the media, plead for “prayer back in public school”, and how safe we were to be in a house of worship.
In September of 1999, another mentally ill gunman entered a Baptist church in Texas and did pretty much the same thing. Not even the house of worship was safe, and it put the church leaders I had been blindly following in a new light: human, flawed. We all worship a perfect God who is not surprised by these events, and allows them to happen.
Why?
Considering all the apathy I experience when I enter most churches these days, add a word to that question: Why Not? Why isn’t this happening more often? Answer: it takes work. Oliver Stone’s Natural Born Killers examined this issue in the 1990’s. He was even charged for the deaths of people close to author John Grisham when criminals imitating that film killed people Mr. Grisham knew. A judge dismissed the case.
But it brought up a good question: how accountable should we be for the works we do? And if there is to be accountability, the judgment should be administered by whom?
In regards to the media, I took almost no time to discover there was no formal business model for Christian filmmaking, if one sought one.
In order to ask anyone to invest money and time into the production of Christian media, a business model was really mandatory. Otherwise, how could one point out the weaknesses of a particular production if there was no frame of reference for the ideal model?
The fact that Jesus is the model of God’s perfection in human form, as documented in the Bible, was not enough, for the multiple interpretive publications of the Bible, in English and other languages, was so confusing, it would be difficult to use one specific Bible version as source material for a screenplay without being blasted for heresy by somebody.
So, each individual filmmaker has to make a choice:
Are you a Christian who happens to make movies,
or
Are you a filmmaker who makes product to satisfy the demands of the Churchgoing Christian market?
It’s possible to be both, but it’s not required. I am both. We’re on the verge of a different industry, one that has stopped alienating the Christian genre, and partly because technology has enabled anyone willing to learn how to use some softwares how to recreate or simulate the supernatural, whether for the big screen or small screen.
The first thing you must realize is that churches that can afford to put money into a film will look upon any producer with the same scrutiny as a bank would. What are your credentials?
One of the first things a producer will need is a working-knowledge of the Bible. Next, get ordained. It doesn’t matter by which denomination.
Filmmakers are essentially producing teaching tools for an educational audience, that is, people who watch Christian films want to learn something about God, or more specifically, Jesus, no matter who is in the cast. Producers who are not ordained ministers get ignored by church pastors.
Further, the primary competition for the attention of a Christian film, is church service itself. When the event of church is reduced to a social event, it is a hybrid of a performance and a lecture.
The next question I will answer is where to begin.
The answer is novel. Literally. Write a novel. Every great screenplay gets ignored without A-list talent attached or a philanthropist blindly throwing money at someone. To gain credibility, regardless of education, write a novel.
As for character, this book is primarily about God’s ongoing development of character. The fact is success destroys some people. As 3-time Oscar winner Bobby Moresco said, “If you can be happier doing anything else, go do it.”
People have lived long, fruitful and joyful lives long before movies were invented. It can be done.
2. Business Model
There could literally be a thousand of these, perhaps distilled down to a half-dozen. There could then be a fight-to-the-death debate on which one is the best, given one’s resources.
My Business Model for Christian movie making is as follows.
1. Identify the demographic your movie is aimed at.
2. Form a corporation. An LLC, or limited liability corporation is simplest and cheapest to form. If you do not know how to do this, take a business class at any college.
3. Assign duties and specify their authority.
Executive producer/producer = pastor
Script = sermon
Cast & crew = ministers
Bible(s) = Source Material
Hire professionals who have made movies before, movies you recognize. For every facet of the process you don’t personally understand completely, take a college-level class. From accounting to editing, whatever you blindly rely on, a third-party for will eventually become a risk that will delay or maim your film.
Accept that the biggest competition filmmakers of the Christian genre have is church service itself. Senior Pastors are essentially the executive producers, amateur playwrights, and totalitarian rules of whatever happens from the podium, pulpit or stage, depending on the church lay out. They perceive any performance as either something that enhances their own show or competes with it for the audience’s attention and money.
Does this apply to all senior pastors? No, I won’t say “all”.
But I have yet to meet the exception to this “rule”.
This means that to get funding, you must go the secular route, unless a pastor/salesman manages to raise money from among a congregation.
Yet the quality of product that has resulted from those projects has paled to whatever work has been done by anyone registered with the Director’s Guild of America. This means that no matter how much money churches raise to execute this endeavor, the makers themselves fail to have mastered their craft.
For this reason, the genre continues to pale in comparison to most of what the world would call “Hollywood”.
The audience size of the genre varies, but is as follows:
Protestant (all denominations)
Agnostic (undecided)
Catholic
Mormon
Jehovah’s Witness
If Catholicism is counted as a denomination, it is the largest of the denominations. Baptist is the second largest, followed by Methodist, then Pentecostal. The first U.S. Census of the 21st century accounted for 38,000 denominations.
3. Respect The Genre
If you don’t respect your film, no one else will either.
Film is for fiction.
Video is for nonfiction and film-support play back on-set.
Christian filmmaking is the cinematic transcription of the Word of God as recorded in the Bible. Considering the material, it deserves the highest respect of production.
This means that all drama should be filmed, not videotaped, as a final product. All talent should be the best available for the budget available.
The script should be a formally developed screenplay, not an inexperienced writer’s first draft. Refine your craft on video and get feedback online, but when it comes to delivering a movie for the whole world to be fed by, do your homework and be thorough on every faze.
Anything less is disrespectful to the Source of the material.
There are hundreds of English translations and hundreds of non-English translations of hundreds of interpretations of the Bible, and each version can be used as one of many resource materials for the screenplay, per the needs of the project.
Remember who you audience is: Mormons? Christian adults 20-35, single, married? Divorced? Pick your battle. You will not be able to make a film that pleases everyone. On the upside, Christian films don’t die. Like wine, they become more marketable with age.
As a cinematic work, Christian films are defined herein as any film that seeks to glorify, acknowledge, or expand on the viewer’s understand of having a faith in and relationship with Jesus Christ. There are degrees of depth at which this topic can be presented, and this book will help illustrate both the business model for those depths, and the impact the process and products can have on communities and individuals.
The polar opposite of Christian filmmaking is sexually explicit content, covered in another section. Some movie producers borrow from the Bible when making their movies, but that does not make them Christian films. Simultaneously, some films marketed as Christian films are anything but.
Of the movies come to mind when describing them with the word, “Christian”, some of them are unflattering. Bad editing, negligent production values, and a limited, self-censoring legalistic audience are among the stereotypes. Myths aside, here’s what we know.
The Passion of The Christ is the number-1 R-rated grossing film of all time. The film was self-financed by Mel Gibson with little-to-no support from the geographical or metaphysical stronghold known as Hollywood. BoxOfficeMojo.com reported the Top 25, give or take, marketed-as-Christian films of all time, as of March, 2011, as follows:
1 The Passion of the Christ $370,782,930
2 The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe $291,710,957
3 The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian $141,621,490 3,929 $55,034,805 3,929
4 The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader $104,017,861
5 The Nativity Story $37,629,831
6 Fireproof $33,456,317
7 Jonah: A VeggieTales Movie $25,581,229
8 One Night With The King $13,395,961
9 The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything $12,981,269
10 The Omega Code $12,614,346
11 End of the Spear $11,967,000
12 Facing the Giants $10,178,331
13 Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed $7,720,487
14 Megiddo: The Omega Code II $6,047,691
15 Luther RS $5,791,328 400 $908,446 400 9/26/03
17 Left Behind Cloud $4,224,065
18 China Cry: A True Story $4,212,828
24 Letters to God $2,848,578
25 God's Army $2,637,726
30 Book of Mormon Movie $1,680,020
31 Joshua $1,461,635
All Time, Adjusted for Inflation:
5 The Ten Commandments Par. $1,050M (1956)
9 The Exorcist WB $886M (1973)
13 Ben-Hur MGM $785M (1959)
44 The Robe Fox $524M (1953)
103 The Passion of The Christ $370M (2004)
There is, undeniably, an audience for Christian media large enough for producers to invest in, whether those producers exist inside our outside the Church. The producers must respect the material to instill the kind of production value in their project that shows a final product representative of the Bible.
4. Worship Film Genre Defined
A worship film is defined as any film that glorifies Jesus Christ. A film marketed as a Christian film may or may or contain any mention of God, Jesus or Christianity. Like worship music, worship films offer viewers the opportunity to enter into an intimate state of worship with the Father.
There are degrees of worship films, as there are genres of worship music. As the publishing industry makes more money on a given genre’s sales, that genre is denominated into sub genres and given more space at retail venues, where people learn new slang, like, “dramedy”.
To place the word “Christian” in front of such an adjective does not automatically mean the content is devoid of elements that general audiences will totally agreed on as acceptable. Your tastes are not my tastes, and no one person or movie studio’s opinion should override the First Amendment that the motion picture industry operates under the protection of. Censorship is dangerous ground.
As for the notation of describing the genre, it is hyphenated, much like “romantic-comedy”. Add Christian or Worship to that. “Christian romantic comedy.” This means Jesus, or God or some kind of Biblical content will be included in the film. Will the film’s theology match your personal beliefs? Who knows, you may change your mind. The movie may have alternate scenes that when viewed differently, will change the context of its message or message delivery.
To understand the genre, a working knowledge of the Bible is essential. To nonbelievers, referencing those who have not accepted Jesus Christ as their personal Lord and Savior, nor have the Holy Spirit dwelling inside them, the Bible will appear as a confusing and contradictory history book of prose and prophesy, indistinguishable from many works of fiction. To Believers, it is a prelude to Christ, followed by the Gospels, concluded by a thorough explanation of what Jesus did on the Cross and how it impacts Mankind. To Believers, the Bible is alive.
Think of the Holy Spirit as a decoder ring for God’s Word. Without Him, you will be unable to understand much of this book or the Bible. Those who know the Lord as their Savior understand the context of using a capital “H” in the word, “Him” versus a low-case h.
There is no such thing as a Christian rating system.
The elements used in this cinematic expression of worship will often not be relevant to the rating system offered by the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), a nonprofit corporation underwritten by the eight major studios: Disney, Warner Brothers, Paramount, Universal, MGM/UA, Sony, 20th Century-Fox, and Lionsgate.
This means that when gauging a “Christian” or “worship” film, the MPAA’s rating system should be ignored, for it is an industry tool grading itself for the sole purpose of selling a particular audience that their films are appropriate for a particular age group. By using the MPAA’s standard, content considered acceptable for the average Sunday school class would be regarded as an “adult theme”, which explains why the film, Facing The Giants received a “PG” rating. The mention of God and quotation of Bible verses were considered adult themes.
Hence, do not use the MPAA’s rating system as a means of gauging any movie to see if it aligns with the Bible.
As for a reliable rating system one can use to gauge quality Christian films? It does not exist. However, the Christian entertainment industry created its own golden calf, the Dove Award, the Christian genre version of the Emmy, Grammy, Golden Globe and Oscar combined.
The filmed sermons of some churches would be rated R. And, cinematically, the visual presentation of semen, feces, urine, in direct or implied contact with human body parts is grounds for NC-17 and XXX ratings.
Two or more jovial people who get enthusiastic about the idea of movie making while discussing media related things on a Sunday morning is not necessarily the best reason to decide to make one. A real film takes years of commitment and resources that may exceed what is readily available on any given Sunday.
This question addresses two facets of Why Am I Doing This? One, ego. For your glory or God’s? Is the end result an audience applauding you whether God is glorified or not? Two, is it a wise investment of money, time, energy, emotion, and other resource? Those who are not honest about this prior to their filmmaking process will be crushed by the Cross at some point in the process.
Why should we bother to have a genre for Christian films at all? Isn’t the word “family” good enough?
Depends who you ask. Corporations develop strategies for filling a market with a given type of product or service, and in this case, that may be pouring millions into a series of films that would be consumed by those who attend churches, cross-denominationally, who also want to watch similar content privately as entertainment or for additional teaching. We haven’t discussed whether or not they believe what they make. (Most pornographers do not watch their own films, the merely generate content that will sell.)
First, Disney. If one asked a young Walt Disney about the kinds of films he was going to make, he would have sounded more like the guys who made Veggie Tales than Michael Eisner. The two men came from two completely different schools of thought. Eisner was a business man who made a name for himself with Paramount Pictures during the 1980’s, helming one of the most profitable winnings streaks in the history of the movie industry.
Walt Disney was interested in art and using his art to cinematranslate the anthology of the Brothers Grimm and Hans Christian Anderson. Those two ambitions conflict in certain arenas, and the Gay audience is one of them.
The Walt Disney Corporation has an objective to generate profit for its stock holders. If that profit is generated by pleasing Audience A, then A gets what they want. If that profit is generated by pleasing Audience B, then B gets what they want.
I once agreed that Disney should be boycotted. I have since changed my opinion: if Christians want Disney to make products a certain way, they should buy stock in the company and cast their votes accordingly. Corporations listen to stockholders, not complainers who aren’t buying their products anyway.
Now, to be clear, I don’t agree with Mr. Eisner’s methods as an executive or his Spiritual beliefs. I do not believe any good can come from using Walt Disney’s animated creations to teach young children that homosexuality is okay, a byproduct of his endorsement of the Gay Day parade at Disney World.
Our forgiving God has not condoned or accepted such sins, but sent His Son to die in payment for them. We remain continuous sinners by default, simultaneously forgiven by God through the blood of Jesus. In the early 21st century, Mr. Eisner has made enough enemies on his own board that about half of his voting shareholders abstained from the vote to reelect him. He took the hint and resigned.
About that time, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch And, The Wardrobe was made. In contrast to its cinematic peer, The Lord of The Rings: The Fellowship of The Ring, it fell flat, failing to win over the very audience that had embraced Christian writer C.S. Lewis decades before. Disney failed to deliver the soul of the film, made by executives who neither believed the material was a vessel for the Gospels, nor cared.
Christian denominations have exceeded the thousands-mark since the turn of the 19th century, and as the 1990’s passed, the popular term “non denominational’ became common. Nobody wanted to claim allegiance to micro legalisms that some of the entities made famous through television and radio, to the point that Non Denomination became its own denomination.
Some audiences refuse to watch a film that doesn’t pre qualify under their personal beliefs, so that audience, from a marketing research point of view, is a maybe. That means that the product must try harder to find that audience or give up on them altogether.
The success of a genre of movies always comes down to marketing. If an audience will go to see a film, then movie makes will try to make the film the way that audience wants to experience it. Very much like ordering a meal at a restaurant, films are increasingly made with multiple plots and endings, and audiences can experience a given story in a variety of ways.
In the creative process, you will be forced to define moral parameters. Don’t assume that your personal tastes, beliefs and interpretations will be agreed upon as your film is being made. In the creative process, everyone seems to develop a prophetic gift whereas God is telling everyone something different, and expects you to acknowledge it as God’s sovereign command, or lose them from the production.
Legalism is dangerous ground, because it is a form of pride - ignoring 1 Corinthians 10:13 and Ephesians 2:8-9, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast.” Legalism leads to theocracy, which leads to the loss of civil rights, which is an affront to God’s Authority, having given us Free Will.
For this reason, do not make your production with volunteers or committees. You need your production staff to be reliant on their wages to pay their bills, and retain hire-fire power over them.
This establishes Authority, not to be mistake with the misconception that a given charity’s intake of money is a sign of God’s blessing. It establishes who is in charge, and this determines who is responsible for success and failure.
When it is time for you to produce or invest in the making of your film, at least you will have asked yourself enough questions regarding what you are doing and why to offer audiences more than they had before watching your film.
As for the content, Christian films cannot be neutral. The Cross doesn’t allow for a comfort zone. The mention of Jesus as the standard for all morality immediately shines a bright light of truth on the sins of those who wish to remain in the dark.
Those living homosexual lifestyles refuse to be told they are living in rebellion to God, and so on. A Christian film will always stir up controversy. Christian films are rarely crowd-pleasers. If the goal is to make a feel-good movie that does not express a view about absolute right and wrong, make something else.
Accept that some people will absolutely never want to see a film if God is mentioned in it or even implied. And among those who do attend church regularly, there is a cluster of that audience that will not see a Christian film if it doesn’t fit into the exact box they have built around themselves in the process of living out their faith.
They have the right to tune in or out whatever they want to. Avoid trying to shape your script or other production elements to please a few scattered people whose opinions will not translate into sales.
The more personal your film is, the more it comes from your heart, the more audiences will respect it regardless of the opinions of the mob. Though the money factor should not determine the content, it will determine how much you get produced, and whether or not this project is your sole opportunity.
Sequels exist for one reason: the producers of the last one still have families to feed.
As for those who want to see Christian films, there is enormous opportunity for producers. As I stated before, the Christian genre has the largest audience in the democratic world.
5. Ratings System
The Hays Code was established in 1930. Between that year and 1968, this code regulated American media. The Hays code was first enforced by U.S. courts in 1934.
Before the MPAA was established in 1968, the studio system adhered to The Hays Code, named after a Catholic priest who headed the committee.
Prior to its inception, films were every bit as controversial and edgy as they seemed after the MPAA replaced the Hays Code.
Here are the rules Hollywood once played by:
General Principles