In an editorial in The Wall Street Journal, a publication that often inspires readers to compare what's in its highly esteemed, award-winning news coverage to what's being professed on its op-ed page and come to the conclusion that somebody's nuts, has published an analysis of the state of the movie business by Ted Baehr, chairman of the Christian Film and Television Commission, and someone named Tom Snyder, who I'm guessing is neither the late, much-missed host of the Tomorrow show not the guy who did Dr. Katz, Professional Therapist, but really, who the hell knows anymore? If there's one thing I've picked up on in the course of doing this job, it's that life's full of surprises, put it that way. Anyway, Baehr is a big wheel with Movieguide, a family-values organization that promotes better living through morally correct movies or something. Part of his op-ed amounts to a press release announcing that Movieguide recently "held its 17th Annual Faith & Values Awards ceremony", where they saluted such entertainments as Fireproof, "which received a $100,000 Epiphany Prize for the Most Inspiring Movie of 2008, sponsored by the John Templeton Foundation." Even more valuable was the information we released in our Report to the Entertainment Industry, a detailed survey of what kinds of movies made money last year, and why. Regular readers of the Screengrab will immediately recall that we did our best to cover the Fireproof experience, because we, too, want to "help families who want to find movies and TV shows that stay within the perimeters of biblical principles", to use Baehr's pithy phrasing, and because opportunities to update readers on the state of Kirk Cameron's career don't come along every day. But the most exciting news to come out of this year's Movieguide report on the state of the art is that Baehr and company have figured out how to keep the entertainment industry solvent in these perilous times. (If you can keep Kirk Cameron solvent, you can do anything.) "With media conglomerates, from Time Warner to Disney to News Corp., reporting big losses," write Baehr and Snyder, "few can afford to ignore proven recipes for box-office success. And when it comes to movies, what succeeds is capitalism, patriotism, faith and values...Once again, family-friendly, uplifting and inspiring movies drew far more viewers in 2008 than films with themes of despair, or leftist political agendas. Sex, drugs and antireligious themes were not automatic sellers, either. Among the 25 top-grossing movies alone, 14 out of 25 had strong or very strong Christian, redemptive and moral content, and nearly all had at least some such content."
These results are based on a close examination of "more than 250 major films from Hollywood studios and independents for their social, political, philosophical, moral and religious content. When all the information -- categorized by dozens of criteria -- is in a database, we calculate which movies took in the most money at the theatrical box office in America and Canada in 2008." We have no doubt that the good people at Movieguide have gone about their work with great devotion and seriousness of intent. But in their efforts to connect with the money changers of Hollywood, they may have come too close to embracing that time-honored but morally dubious practice known as Hollywood accounting.
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