Writer: Joe Westbury, Georgia Christian Index
When Alex and Stephen Kendrick asked their church to pray for a media breakthrough to draw attention to their latest movie, Facing the Giants, they were not exactly prepared for a worldwide firestorm throughout the secular and evangelistic communities that would reverberate in the halls of Congress.
But that’s what happened in late June when the Los Angeles-based Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) gave the family movie a PG rating based on “thematic elements.”
And that’s where the media frenzy began.
The 10-member association first said the rating was based on the movie’s religious theme. But after it received a record 15,000 e-mails, it backpedaled and said the rating was due to frank discussions of pregnancy and infertility.
With just three months before its national rollout on Sept. 29, the movie shot to the top of national and international conversation and was prominently featured on Good Morning America, FOX News, CNN, the front page of the Los Angeles Times, and in Variety, Hollywood’s major trade publication. European newspapers also picked up the discussion and brought further exposure to the brothers and Albany’s Sherwood Baptist Church, whose Sherwood Pictures produced the 111-minute movie about football and faith.
The rating, which has brought stern criticism against the MPAA for giving the movie anything other than a G rating, has actually turned into a mixed blessing, the brothers say.
“At first we were a little surprised at the ruling, but we believe that God is going to use this for his glory. Due to that rating, we believe it will attract an even larger audience who might not go to a G-rated movie.”
Was the Christian theme a factor in the movie’s rating?
Alex Kendrick said when he and his brother were first writing the movie, they thought it would probably garner the PG rating, but for different reasons — the discussions on infertility and the rough-and-tough football scenes. But they didn’t think its Christian theme would put it off limits to children. Quite the opposite, they viewed it as a feel-good family movie with strong moral values.
The brothers said they never had a conversation with the MPAA before the ruling came out and never appealed the group’s decision. But within days of the ruling, they were guests on national television and radio to discuss the movie, but largely kept out of the fracas. Their answer to prayer was complete.
The controversy escalated further on July 1 when House Majority Whip Roy Blunt, R-Mo., and other lawmakers demanded an explanation from the MPAA. Blunt found the rating, based on its religious content, to be unconscionable.
“This incident raised the disquieting possibility that the MPAA considers exposure to Christian themes more dangerous for children than exposure to gratuitous sex and violence,” he said in a letter to MPAA chairman and chief executive officer Dan Glickman.
Blunt also brought up a recent study by the Harvard School of Public Health, which found that the MPAA standards on sex and violence in movies have been getting weaker, according to the Washington, D.C.-based National Examiner newspaper.
Or, were the mature discussions in the movie the reason?
In response, the MPAA’s Glickman said “any strong or mature discussion of any subject matter results in at least a PG rating. This movie had a mature discussion about pregnancy, for example. It also had other mature discussions that some parents might want to be aware of before taking their kids to see this movie.”
The controversy has a clouded, and disputed, early beginning.
“The first communication from the MPAA was that religion was a factor in the rating,” said Kris Fuhr, vice president of marketing at Provident Films, which is owned by Sony Pictures and is distributing the movie. “Since then, the MPAA has revised those factors to no longer include religion.”
Fuhr said she is now satisfied with the rating and wants to move beyond the controversy to focus on marketing the film, billed as an inspirational drama about a high school football coach who relies on faith to battle fear and failure.
And that’s the unapologetically Christian message which the Kendrick brothers hope will come through to their audiences.
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