5 Things Faith-Based Films Get Right
(ANALYSIS) Faith-based industry films are often criticized, but there’s a reason that they constitute such a popular genre.
Movies like “War Room,” “I Can Only Imagine,” “God’s Not Dead,” “Jesus Revolution” and “Sound of Freedom” easily rub shoulders at the box office with other offerings that Hollywood has released.
Often panned both by secular and Christian film critics, faith-based films have been criticized for many things, whether it’s for the writing, acting or for perceived problematic messages.
READ: Should Christians Avoid Horror Films Like ‘The Nun II’?
And yet, with all of the criticism, much of it valid (including much of it by me), it can get lost what good things there are in what we call “faith-based films” — movies made by people of faith for people of faith — that cause them to resonate so strongly with so many people.
I’m taking the opportunity to offer up the top five things that I, as a film critic who is both a Christian as well as often very critical of the industry, think faith-based films do well:
5. Authentic faith
This may seem obvious, but it’s worth making the point.
I remember hearing a story from an immigrant who came to America and surprised to see so many churches. She had only known about this country through Hollywood movies — and they barely show Christianity let alone religion in general.
According to a 2021 Gallup poll, about 3 in 4 Americans said they identify with a specific religious faith. By far the largest proportion, 69%, identify with Christianity, including 35% who say they are Protestant, 22% Catholic and 12% who identify with another denomination or just simply as “Christian.”
Of U.S. adults, 36% go to church at least once a week, 55% pray at least once a day, 35% read their Bible at least once a week, 33% say they get their sense of right and wrong from religion and 46% say they feel a sense of wonder about the universe at least once a week.
Despite all that, movies hardly ever portray these things as if they are an important part of people’s lives.
Faith-based films do the job that Hollywood won’t of representing the lives of the faithful. Whether that’s wrestling with marriage in “Fireproof,” fatherhood in “Courageous,” forgiveness where God is when we suffer like “The Shack,” “Father Stu” (a personal favorite) and “I Still Believe.” Then there’s topics such as how families really talk to each other about their faith like in “On A Wing And A Prayer” (another personal favorites) and “The Hill,” or how we wrestle with Christian hypocrisy in “Church People” and “Believe Me” (another favorite).
Considering that faith is so much a part of how the majority of people express their humanity, the fact that Hollywood usually leaves it out is almost to lie about what it means to be human. As Catholic film critic Steven Greydanus points out, how could “Avengers: Endgame” really grapple with what it looks like to grieve without showing any characters wrestling with faith in that process?
I have previously written about how even when Hollywood tries to talk about religion, it doesn’t do it from the perspective of the faithful. Movies like “Exodus: God’s and Kings,” “Noah,” “The Chosen One,” “First Reformed” and “Silence” attempt to talk about faith, but they don’t talk about it from the perspective of the majority of people who actually have it. Faith-based films actually honestly represent the experience of faith of the faithful.
4. Representing moms
Very few movies are made for moms.
It’s not radical to point out that most movies are made for the male demographic, with every movie today trying to be a superhero flick. Even when movies are made for women — outside of Jane Austen adaptations — they’re typically geared to single women and focus on crude expressions of sexuality (such as “Sex and The City”) and far-left politics (such as “Barbie”) that do not resonate with the majority of married women who are also most likely to describe religion as deeply important to them.
But faith-based films make moms over 30 their target market and produce films for their tastes and their life concerns. That’s why the movies largely resemble inspirational dramas or Hallmark movies that the married mom demographic loves, that stay within the G to PG range like Hallmark movies and focus on being inspirational and comforting. In other words, they talk about issues married moms are concerned about or are reflective of their experiences. This is the case with movies such as “Fireproof,” “Courageous,” “I Can Only Imagine,” “American Underdog” and “Jesus Revolution.”
Thirty-something guys like me and my friends often complain that faith-based films seem to only go after this demographic, but we all admit that it’s a good thing that faith-based films are making married moms and their experiences visible in a culture that very often makes them invisible.
My mom once told me a story about how “War Room” deeply resonated with her because she so often found that when she had a problem with someone and wanted to change them, they would never change. It was only when she stopped trying to change them and instead made praying to God a consistent pattern in her life that those people started to change without her trying. “War Room” is often attacked for being an “unrealistic” portrayal of how prayer works — and perhaps, in some ways, it is — but it’s also one of the few that my mom says resonated with her experience.
3. Practical moral virtue
Most movies are typically made with entertainment or some social cause in mind. And typically, when they praise virtue, such as in superhero movies, they don’t do it in such a way that doesn’t make their lesson easy to apply to one’s own life. How does one apply the lessons of Batman or Iron Man to one’s own life if one isn’t rich or doesn’t have superpowers? How does one apply the lesson of deconstructing one’s toxic sense of masculine identity in “The Power of The Dog,” as just an example?
From the very beginning, faith-based films have stressed telling stories with easy application to one’s own life. “Fireproof,” “Courageous,” and “War Room” were written to address the real problems in marriage and parenthood that their audience was going through. They have characters who solve problems in ways the audience can easily apply to their own life. These movies even feature books that you could buy for more instruction.
“God’s Not Dead” tried to teach Christians real apologetics lessons (badly, but still!) of how to push back on teachers and politicians who want to demean them for their faith. Political cause movies like “Unplanned” and “Sound of Freedom” portray real organizations you can volunteer with and donate to — and in some cases, give you the contact info to donate as part of the closing credits.
My dad once told me a story of how he was struggling with really wanting to be a better husband. After watching “Fireproof,” he bought the book “The Love Dare” featured in it (and written for it), which outlined step-by-step instructions on how to be a better spouse. He started putting its principles into practice. He found amazing improvement after that.
Of course, one can agree or disagree with faith-based films’ solutions to the problems they address (I often do). But the fact that they actually make it their concern to give people a practical vision for their real problems is something that Hollywood could (and should) emulate. In many ways, faith-based films see themselves as pastors of the church. They take their responsibility to actually make a practical positive difference in people’s lives very seriously.
2. Glorifying God
Robert Eggers, director of such films as “The Witch” and “The Northman,” recently said something deeply poignant about the tragedy of being a creative in the modern world:
“I think it’s hard to do this kind of creative work in a modern secular society because it becomes all about your ego and yourself. And I am envious — this is the horrible part — I’m envious of medieval craftsmen who are doing the work for God. And that becomes a way to … you get to be creative to celebrate something else. And also, you’re censoring yourself because it’s not about like me, me, me, me, me, me. So you say, ‘Oh, I got to rein that back because that’s not what this altar piece needs to be.’ Any worldview where everything around them is full of meaning is exciting to me, because we live in such a tiresome, lame, commercial culture now.”
The tragedy he talks about is that artists have only two choices – make art for money or make art for self-expression. That’s not true in the faith-based film industry. True, people in the faith-based film industry make art for themselves and for money, but they’re also making art for God.
I’ve been privileged to work with people who have stars in their eyes as they talk about the movies they make and why they make them. The passion, their willingness to work for free, to all pitch in together, because they believe they are making something not just for an audience, not just for self-expression, not just for money, but for God, is something deeply holy and redemptive.
This comes out in the kind of movies that they make, which make God the object of worship in their films. Every movie worships something, because as David Foster Wallace notes, humans all worship something. Romantic comedies worship love, superhero movies worship good people with power and faith-based films worship God. In films such as “Breakthrough,” “I Can Only Imagine,” “Miracles From Heaven,” “On A Wing and A Prayer,” “Church People” and “Redeeming Love” it is God who saves. And we need stories like that, because — as Wallace goes on to remind us — anything we worship other than God will ultimately “eat us alive.”
1. Rapid Innovation
The faith-based film industry as we know it has been around for 20 years with the start of “The Passion of The Christ” and “Facing The Giants.”
Since then, it has rapidly grown from The Kendrick Brothers and Pureflix making badly-acted, cheesy inspirational dramas and political polemics to The Erwin Brothers’ “Kingdom Storybook Company” making decent-quality true-life inspirational dramas.”
At the same time, Angel Studios is making Biblical dramas with “The Chosen,” faith-based fantasy with “The Wingfeather Saga” and action dramas with “Sound of Freedom.” Affirm pictures is making faith-based children’s comedies with “Journey To Bethlehem.” The Daily Wire is producing R-rated faith-based dramas like “Shut In.” Amazon is nailing it with “On A Wing And A Prayer, and a whole cadre of smaller independent filmmakers and distributors making comedies like “Church People” and horror movies like “Nefarious.”
This is all due to the passionate work of believers who truly believe that they are glorifying God by making the faith-based film industry better than it already is. It’s also due to the faithful work of Christian film critics like Kevin McCreary, Tyler Smith, Jeffery Overstreet and Alyssa Wilkinson, who have been telling the truth about the weaknesses of faith-based films so that people can recognize their weaknesses and correct them.
Because of these things, I am deeply grateful for the existence of faith-based films. And I am even more hopeful for their future.
How about you? What do you love most about faith-based films? Let us know in the comments below.
Joseph Holmes is an award-nominated filmmaker and culture critic living in New York City. He is co-host of the podcast “The Overthinkers” and its companion website theoverthinkersjournal.world, where he discusses art, culture and faith with his fellow overthinkers. His other work and contact info can be found at his website josephholmesstudios.com.