When the Kendrick brothers met with their usual Hollywood movie studio contacts to distribute their latest picture, “Lifemark,” which came out Friday, the Christian filmmakers received a response they weren’t used to hearing: No thanks.
The three brothers based in Albany, Georgia, are known for making religious-themed pictures that perform fairly well at the box office, yet none of the big studios wanted “Lifemark,” two of them said. That’s because the movie dives head first into the abortion debate and expresses a clear opinion — that putting a child up for adoption is a much better choice than terminating a pregnancy.
The brothers, Alex, Stephen and Shannon, found a new partner in Fathom Events, a company owned by the three largest U.S. theater chains, to distribute the movie, and box office analysts said it could become a breakout hit in what’s expected to be an otherwise slow weekend for new releases.
The movie is part of a growing segment of the entertainment industry: faith-based pictures, particularly Christian ones. While films centered around God and stories from the Bible have always been around, they’re increasing in popularity. By some counts, eight of the top 10 highest-grossing Christian films of all time were released in the past decade.
Fathom Events Chief Executive Officer Ray Nutt said religious films are the biggest single part of his business. Christian filmmakers are expecting an additional windfall after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned a landmark abortion-rights ruling in June, Nutt said, saying filmgoers are energized by the verdict.
“People, producers and filmmakers have seen the value that this brings, not only the message that it brings to audiences and the way that it moves audiences, but also the financial end of it and how much money it makes,” said Nutt. “We are looking at many, many faith-based films into 2023.”
“Lifemark” came about after Kirk Cameron, a 51-year-old actor who rose to fame on the 1980s sitcom “Growing Pains,” heard of a documentary about the main characters in the movie. He acquired the rights and sought to partner with the Kendricks, who have mostly distributed their films through a unit of Sony Group.
The Kendrick brothers believe their faith has allowed them to create movies. They said they once prayed for “$100,000 and a specific high-definition camera” to make “Facing the Giants,” about high school football players turning to religion. It grossed about $10.2 million in North America upon its release in 2006.
They founded their company, Kendrick Brothers, in 2013. Their hits include 2015’s “War Room,” about a couple saving their marriage through faith. It took in nearly $68 million in ticket sales.
“Lifemark” stars Cameron as the adoptive father of a boy whose teen birth mother previously considered an abortion. Fathom doesn’t have an estimate for how much money the movie will generate but Cameron said he’d be delighted with $15 million over its limited, seven-day run. He’s also excited about the film’s message, because he believes the revocation of federal abortion rights, a political position for which he’s advocated, will lead to unwanted and neglected kids.
“There will be a lot more babies in the country who will need moms and dads in homes and need to be taken care of because of the overturning of Roe versus Wade,” he said. “Who takes care of them? Well, there is an answer to that. At least one part of the answer is adoption.”
Cameron acknowledged adoption doesn’t always work as well as portrayed in “Lifemark.” Teens comprised 12% of abortion patients in 2014, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a pro-abortion rights research group. Pro-abortion rights advocates say depictions can create a skewed view of the average abortion recipient, who is typically in their 20s and already has at least one child.
And some of the estimated 100,000 kids in the U.S. who are waiting to be adopted will be among those seeing “Lifemark.” Group homes for children bought out theaters to promote their adoption work, according to Jackie Papier, who manages group sales for Fathom. She’s also gotten inquiries from political groups, a woman who wants to start an anti-abortion club at her school and an insurance company that wants to take wealthy clients interested in funding similar projects.
The Kendrick brothers have also said they want to influence public opinion, arguing in a promotional video that the rights of individual people are less important than God’s will. “We believe in morally responsible filmmaking, which can come out of a heart of love,” Stephen Kendrick added in an interview.
The $15 million figure Cameron is hoping for is moderate by Hollywood standards, but conventional studios aren’t planning any big movies until the DC Comics film “Black Adam” is released in late October.
“Faith-based movies often are underestimated, and fly under the radar until they open and suddenly become a number one movie,” said Paul Dergarabedian, a senior analyst at research group Comscore Inc. “In the very slow marketplace such as it is right now, this could be a opportune time for such a release.”
Church screenings
Nutt, who specializes in films not suited for typical theatrical debuts, like concerts or old classics, has worked to put other faith-based movies straight to congregates in pews. A few years ago Fathom tasked Bob Elder, a faith-based movie marketer who started his career running Christian bookstores, with circumventing the normal theater distribution system to put religious movies in churches. They now do so through the Faith Content Network, which gives churches free digital tools to show first-run religious movies and charge for tickets.
After offering ministries the typical studio-theater split of ticket revenue, they found many churches wouldn’t even cash the checks they received. Churches no longer get a cut of ticket sales, Elder said.
“They exist to serve and to love and so they see the movies as ministry tools,” Elder said. “It’s about expanding their reach, influence the message in the community.”
The Kendrick brothers aren’t deterred by the recent rejection of “Lifemark” by some Hollywood studios. They see plenty of opportunity for their films in the future.
“There’s over a billion people around the world that say they want to be followers of Christ,” Stephen Kendrick said. “And so there’s actually a massive underserved market.”
