Here’s that list:

10. No Country for Old Men (2007)

9. Iron Man (2008)

8. Inception (2010)

7. Sherlock Holmes (2009)

6. The Departed (2006)

5. The Hurt Locker (2008)

4. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008)

3. The Bucket List (2007)

2. Crash (2004)

1. The Blind Side (2009)

Surprised?  I was.  I mean, Inception shouldn’t count cause you have to rent it like 18 times to figure out what the heck-balls are going on.  You don’t ever fully have that Ah ha! moment, either, until you realize this is Leo DiCaprio’s Titanic sequel.  Watch them back to back and you’ll wet your pants.  No, really, together they’re like 12 hours long so schedule in lots of runpeepee breaks.

Other than that there are some interesting similarities.  For example, most of these films were major Academy Award contenders for their respective years.  That’s a lot of free marketing and publicity.  People don’t want to be the only ones in the office to NOT have seen and/or comment on “Benjamin Button” and the creepy Brad Pitt head on that shriveled leprechaun body.  On the up side he’s got my vote for Gollum in The Hobbit prequel filming now, if something happens to other Gollum dude.

“Welcome to fightssss clubsssss, my preciousssssssseessss Hobitsesssss!”

Also, I will admit that I personally am responsible for “The Blind Side” being at #1 because I have rented it no less than 147 times with every intention of viewing it….right up until the time it arrives and them I’m all….wellllllll, maybe we’ll just do “Wedding Crashers” again, because…duh…Rachel McAdams!

Yup.  Still haven’t seen Blind Side but have every intention to.  Mostly because I’ve cited it in so many examples and held it in esteem for being one of the best faith-based films in recent history.  Prolly need to watch it to confirm.  But when you write by the Spirit like I do, truth just seeps outta your fingertips and slathers all over the MacBook Pro keyboard — which incidentally is how Colossians was written, I understand, in the original Apple Hebrew which Google Translated into King James during the 1600s sometime.

True story, bruh.

Anywho….look again at the top 3.  Very strong family/moral almost faith-based-esque dramas.  Are some of them rated “R”?  You betcha.  Do they pull any punches and leave us with a syruppy sweet happily ever after ending and a bible verse?  Nope.  They are well told, well produced, well acted, well shot…well…masterpieces.  They all have strong, gripping character dramas — even IronMan and Sherlock Holmes are not lost in the effects (*cough* George Lucas take note *cough*).  The effects support the story.

Also interesting is that these films didn’t own the box-office records.  There are no Pixar films in this bunch.  No Avatar, Titanic or Dark Knight.  And poor James Cameron is crying all the way to the bank.  That’s okay, he may have lost Netflix, but he can still become King of RedBox if he just applies himself a liiiiiittle bit more.

Let’s make a movie!

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(EXCERPT) For live-action films, location scouting is not out of the ordinary. But for an animated movie like the new “Winnie the Pooh,” even directors Don Hall and Stephen Anderson were surprised to have a budget to travel to Ashdown Forest in East Sussex, England, to see the inspiration for the Hundred Acre Wood.

“We suggested that idea, almost as a joke, because we didn’t think they’d actually send us,” Hall admits.

While Hall and Anderson were in England, they also toured several London museums to see E.H. Shepard’s original drawings for A.A. Milne’s Winnie the Pooh stories. The entire film is hand-drawn with a watercolor aesthetic, just like Shepard’s artwork. Other research for the cast and crew involved family screenings of all the previous Pooh classics.

“I think the idea of Winnie the Pooh coming back into the building was something we wouldn’t have anticipated … but suddenly it was a really exciting proposition,” Anderson says.

It had been 35 years since Pooh and his friends had been in Walt Disney AnimationStudios (recent films came from the straight-to-DVD unit) and 85 years since Milne introduced the characters to the world in his first storybook. The pressure was on for the filmmakers to handle the beloved and timeless characters with care. Modernizing the film for audiences without tampering with the classic aspects of it came in a few different forms.

“We didn’t want iPads or iPhones, even in Christopher Robin’s bedroom when we dressed the set,” Hall says. “We didn’t want to make it so period that it was strictly things from 1922. We opened it up a little bit, but we just wanted it to feel timeless.”

Bridging the old and the new in the new “Winnie the Pooh” movies is Jim Cummings, the third person to have voiced Pooh, having taken over the role in the late ’80s. Cummings has been exercising his voice versatility since then as the voice of both innocent Pooh and adventurous Tigger, including numerous scenes alone between the two friends.

“I’m glad they’re very, very different,” Cummings says. “I used to switch back and forth … but years and years ago, and I’m the only person that heard this probably, but I almost heard a syllable of Pooh at the beginning of a Tigger word. So I said from that day, ‘I have to do Pooh separately,’ and I always do Pooh first, then Tigger.”

Though diligent in maintaining the timeless factor of Pooh, Hall and Anderson also linked the film to the present-day generation through the musical talents of singer-songwriter and actress Zooey Deschanel.

“We wanted to get somebody contemporary to record [the opening theme], but the list of appropriate artists is a pretty small list. So when they showed us the list with her name on it, we felt like that was perfect. She is contemporary, she’s hip and cool and kind of trendy, but her sound’s not at all contemporary — it’s a throwback,” Hall says.

“Our mandate was that Winnie the Pooh should find a broad audience — little kids, big kids, teenagers, twentysomethings and beyond,” Hall says.

Read the whole article at MovingPicturesNetwork.

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- Summer 2009’s total gross stands at over $4.2 billion through Sept. 3, the highest ever. It was the third summer in a row to exceed $4 billion.

- Due to when Labor Day landed this year, Summer 2009 did have an extra week over 2008, but it still grossed more in the same amount of time.

- In terms of estimated attendance, however, Summer 2009 was no record breaker. Summer 2002 is still tops on this front, followed by 1999, 2003, 2004, 2007, 1998 and 2001.

- While no movie was as monumental as ‘The Dark Knight’ from last year, ‘Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen’ is on the verge of hitting $400 million and ranks as the ninth highest-grossing picture of all time.

- The ‘Transformers’ sequel and many other movies were in line with reasonable expectations, but the breakout success of Summer 2009 was ‘The Hangover.’ With $270.7 million and counting, the ribald comedy became the highest-grossing picture of its sub-genre and has nearly matched the final tally of ‘There’s Something About Mary’ adjusted for ticket price inflation. The ‘Star Trek’ re-launch also excelled by becoming the top picture of its franchise, adjusted for ticket price inflation.

- The comedy genre ran the gamut from the successes of ‘The Hangover’ and ‘The Proposal’ to the season’s bigger failures: ‘Land of the Lost,’ ‘Year One,’ ‘Bruno’ and ‘Funny People.’ The industry had high hopes based on these movies’ high profile release dates, but many may have been blinded by the big name talent involved: each picture was fundamentally flawed in terms of audience appeal, mining material that has disappointed time and again in the past.

The Top-Grossing Movies of Summer 2009 (as of Sept. 3)

Rank. Movie Title (Distributor) / Total Gross in Millions

1. ‘Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen’ (Paramount) / $399.6

2. ‘Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince’ (Warner Bros.) / $295.1

3. ‘Up’ (Disney) / $289.9

4. ‘The Hangover’ (Warner Bros.) / $270.7

5. ‘Star Trek’ (Paramount) / $256.8

Source: Box Office Mojo (www.boxofficemojo.com)

BOX OFFICE MOJO, founded by Brandon Gray in 1999, is published daily at http://www.boxofficemojo.com. The online publication features the most comprehensive, accurate and thoughtful box office analysis and tracking available.

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Yes, although to get 100 screens is a monumental undertaking.  The term in film is called “Four Walling”.  It’s where you strike a deal with a theater to show your movie.  Sometimes you just buy the theater outright (by the four walls).  Or you do a revenue share with the theater. 

For a one-off screening, it’s not too difficult.  But to do any kind of multi-day run gets more complicated-especially if you plan to screen during Friday or Sat night.  The theaters have contracts with the studios to show it on so many screens etc… They don’t mind bending the rules for a one off deal, but Warner Bros will get pretty mad if a theater cuts their tentpole movie on a Friday night so that some indie film can be shown.

It took a lot of time and energy to do 7 screens around Dallas and Houston last October for Imposter for a Sun-Thur run.  I can’t imagine 100 screens and trying to get bodies in the seats.  It’s tough.  

When we talked with Millican it was concerning a recent release called, “The One Lamb” which, even though it was not technically ready for a theatrical release, was accepted into Carmike Cinema’s Independent Film Series which gave the film screen time in about 100 theaters across the U.S.

Now, the award-winning film called “The Widow’s Might by 19-year-old John Moore and his best friend David Heustis is following that same path.

(EXCERPT) On April 13, 19-year-old director John Moore’s independent film, “The Widow’s Might” will open in 94 U.S. cities across the Midwest and South as part of Carmike Cinemas and Dalton Pictures’ Independent Film Series. 

“The Widow’s Might”, is a feature length musical comedy produced by nineteen-year-old John Moore and his best friend David Heustis, and is the film that won the largest cash prize in the country, 101,000 dollars, at this year’s San Antonio Independent Christian Film Festival.

“The Widow’s Might” is the story of two aspiring filmmakers with the dream of winning a national film festival. When an elderly widow faces losing her home due to escalating property taxes, the filmmakers take action, along with their friends. Through political smears and on-set mishaps, the filmmakers face challenge after challenge.

Geoff Botkin, veteran film producer and film festival judge, marked “The Widow’s Might” as a milestone in Christian filmmaking. “‘Widow’s Might’ is a groundbreaking film, even though it is a first feature film from a teenaged director. It is one of the most original high-concept features in recent film history. The story is innovative in ways that can inspire the next generation of filmmakers, many of whom are looking for ways to break out of tired cinematic cliches.” Botkin also added, “This film attempted and achieved a wholesome family message, illustrating the difficult-to-capture functional family environment…”

Read the full article on the Christian Newswire

Theatrical locations and times are listed at the film website,www.WidowsMightTheMovie.com. 

For more information, or to schedule an interview with John Moore, please call 214-934-6850 or e-mail Jennifer Langen atContact@TheWidowsCry.com.

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Wired4Film is here to help!  By spending some time browsing the interwebs (especially BoxOfficeMojo.com and IMDb.com) we were able to compile a list of theatrically released Independent films with budgets ranging from $60K to $10M.  

Don’t be mislead.  These are not all Faith-based films by any stretch of the imagination.  But, if a film on this list has a bunch of similar qualities (genre, locations, casting requirements) to what your script is, then it’s easier to forecast similar results.  Not that your film will achieve similar results, but right now the burden of proof is on you to show that your idea could conceivably work in the marketplace.  

Unless your investor is just looking for a write-off.  In which case, just grab your buds,  a handicam from school and knock that thing out over your Spring break.

These films are listed in order of their Production Budgets.  It’s also a fair assumption that because they were shown in the Theater, that half of those Box Office Receipts stay with the Distributor.  Just something to think about.  It’s not all gravy.

Oscar weekend’s box office winner was the Tyler Perry flick, Madea Goes to Jail.  The comedy about a grandmother behind bars locked up the weekend box office in North America with 41.1 million dollars in ticket sales, final figures showed Monday.

According to reports, it was the largest opening weekend gross on the fewest amount of screens ever (2,032) – and the highest grossing weekend opening in Lionsgate history.

It was also Tyler Perry’s best film debut.  Per Box Office Mojo:

1. Madea Goes to Jail                        $41,030,947       2,032 Screens       2/20/09

2. Madea’s Family Reunion            $30,030,661       2,194 Screens       2/24/06

3. Diary of a Mad Black Woman   $21,905,089        1,703 Screens      2/25/05   

4. Why Did I Get Married?              $21,353,789        2,011 Screens       10/12/07

5. Meet the Browns                           $20,082,809      2,006 Screens        3/21/08

6. The Family that Preys                 $17,381,218        2,070 Screens       9/12/08

7. Daddy’s Little Girls                      $11,210,754         2,111 Screens         2/14/07

(EXCERPT) The Christmas box office has turned into a cash cow for a diverse litter of titles, guaranteeing that ticket sales for 2008 will match or exceed last year’s record-breaking haul of $9.62 billion.

“Marley,” produced by Fox 2000 and New Regency, was one of five titles opening nationwide on Christmas Day. All but one — “The Spirit” — are collecting plenty of coin and seeing the sort of midweek grosses that can make the week between Christmas and New Year’s the most lucrative stretch of the year.

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(EXCERPT) Hollywood studios are scaling back production, but you wouldn’t know that by looking at the multiplexes in the first part of 2009.  The first few months of the year were once a graveyard for the least promising fare, but ’09 is seeing a flood of titles entering the marketplace.

There are numerous reasons for the glut. With the summer and holiday frames jam-packed, the majors can no longer afford to save their best titles for those key dates. And studios are using the January-April period to open a cluster of pics that were put into production before the 2007-08 writers strike.

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Movies produced by Christians that promote or embody their religions.  (1980-Present) from http://www.BoxOfficeMojo.com