Christian films are always a bit of a tough one for me. I understand the value of providing family friendly content but honestly the Christian film industry has so much work to do. The movie is fine I guess - it's a safe watch and parents won't have their finger on the clicker worried about scary or inappropriate content which for some will be enough. But it shouldn't be.
Christian movies can't get a free pass because they mention God in it when the storytelling, editing, acting, continuity, etc. Is below average. It's not fair to take Camp Rock or High School Musical and "Christianize" them and say it's a great film. We (associating myself with the faith community here) unfortunately do this all the time though. It doesn't work. The bar can be so much higher and it should be expected to be. Taking existing stories and giving them the slightest alteration isn't even a "faith-film" problem, the same issue of taking an existing movie almost exactly and giving it a slight remix happens in more mainstream properties as well (i.e. Making all the ghostbusters female) but when that happens with a large studio film it understandably goes through the wringer by its audience.
Here's an example of the difference in expectation for creative output between a faith film and a "mainstream" one: For instance, if a Disney Channel musical just took a bunch of popular tracks and used them in their movie rather than writing original, fun, pieces it wouldn't be accepted. People would put it on blast. This movie took existing Christian songs and "bopped" them up for many of their musical numbers, and I haven't seen anyone bothered by that. It's not the end of the world of course - I'm just using it as an illustration of the low bar Christian movies are able to operate with.
I think it's okay to hold faith movies to a high standard of story-telling and creativity. Sometimes it feels like christian movies can cut corners because the intended audience will give them a break no matter what because it's "family friendly." It's too bad.
Christian movies can't get a free pass because they mention God in it when the storytelling, editing, acting, continuity, etc. Is below average. It's not fair to take Camp Rock or High School Musical and "Christianize" them and say it's a great film. We (associating myself with the faith community here) unfortunately do this all the time though. It doesn't work. The bar can be so much higher and it should be expected to be. Taking existing stories and giving them the slightest alteration isn't even a "faith-film" problem, the same issue of taking an existing movie almost exactly and giving it a slight remix happens in more mainstream properties as well (i.e. Making all the ghostbusters female) but when that happens with a large studio film it understandably goes through the wringer by its audience.
Here's an example of the difference in expectation for creative output between a faith film and a "mainstream" one: For instance, if a Disney Channel musical just took a bunch of popular tracks and used them in their movie rather than writing original, fun, pieces it wouldn't be accepted. People would put it on blast. This movie took existing Christian songs and "bopped" them up for many of their musical numbers, and I haven't seen anyone bothered by that. It's not the end of the world of course - I'm just using it as an illustration of the low bar Christian movies are able to operate with.
I think it's okay to hold faith movies to a high standard of story-telling and creativity. Sometimes it feels like christian movies can cut corners because the intended audience will give them a break no matter what because it's "family friendly." It's too bad.