Which Came First? - "Son of God" or "The Bible"

They knew what they had was dynamic.  They were smart, did their research and worked hard -- and the result was the Son of God big screen version that is expected to gross anywhere from $25.7M to $26.7M in its debut weekend.  People in this world achieve great success for a reason, but not all get the reason why -- whether it be George Clooney, who has used his celebrity to bring well-needed attention to the horrors of Darfur, or Angelina Jolie, whose humanitarian work is also well needed and appreciated, or Mel Gibson, whose The Passion Of The Christ  brought the word of God beyond borders anyone had ever seen before ($611M worldwide -- that's a lot of eyes).  These are the kings of charity, who understand their responsibility in the world.  Mark Burnett -- the reality TV entrepreneur behind such phenoms Survivor, The Voice, Shark Tank, and The Apprentice -- understands the reason why, too.  He and wife Roma Downey know in their core that they are on that path now -- to spread the word to as many people as possible.

On the wings of angels (and butterflies) and in many languages -- the marketing behind this film is very interesting:  The team wisely dubbed a Spanish version for this weekend's movie debut, and it was put in 200 theaters; they also did a subtitled Korean-language version and placed it in 15 select theaters.

"Because we are a small organization, we don't have to ask permission -- we just do it,"  Burnett said.

The theaters playing Spanish-language Son of God  grew in just a few days as they were booking theaters and 4% of the gross came from those theaters; 22% of the audience was Hispanic.  In addition, the film had a phenomenal 91% rating on PostTrak [an exit polling service that reports box office audience demographics and the aspects of each title that trigger interest and attendance in that film -- all in real time] and was heavily weighted to excellent with an impressive 72%.  In addition, it has an incredible 80% recommend and played 62% female to 38% male with 82% of moviegoers over age 25.

Here's the thing:  Son of God was edited into a movie before History's miniseries The Bible.

"We got the team that did Gladiator and we had to redo everything for the big screen," Burnett said.  "It took about a year of editing, but we did it."

 

Burnett and Downey followed their gut and kept moving forward, determined to fulfill a bigger purpose, with the quiet knowledge that they were put here for something greater.  They met with church groups and promoted the film heavily through them.  They connected with a Colorado-based company called Compassion International, which bought up group-sale tickets and gave them away to churches in 40 US cities, helping to fuel $4.5M in pre-sales.  No one knew what this little movie was going to do.  There was no model for it.  And then it opened on its first night...BOOM! $1.2M.  Everyone sat up and took notice.  Immediately.

Son of God will spread the Word of God.  The film already has been sold in 60 territories worldwide.  The 10-part TV series about the Bible has already been broadcast weekly on the History Channel with record breaking ratings.  It began with 13.1M viewers, stayed consistently around 10M viewers and ended with 14.1M.  It also did well on home video.  And now a new audience is finding this on the big screen.

It all began on the set of The Bible series in Morocco, Downey and Burnett held screenings with footage cut together from daily shoots for the crew to see.  The entire crew.  Everyone, no matter what their jobs were, would come in and watch what had been shot.  They were not dailies but edited, completed pieces.  While watching one of these screenings, Downey turned to her husband and said:

"This is really good.  We should be making a big film."

 And from that footage and those words began Son of God.  The movie actually was edited and done before The Bible series.

BECOME A CHILD OF GOD TODAY

John 3:16

For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.

Sources:  http://movies.yahoo.com/news/son-god-born-bible-angels-helped-along-way-163624478.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WcIXCok9HPg
http://www.rentrak.com/section/our_services/box_office/posttrak.html

Tags:  Son of God, Jesus, Bible, eternal life, History Channel, box office movie