Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Home
Religious Music & Entertainment
From Breakthrough to The Garden: How will Disney’s acquisition of 20th Century Fox affect “faith-based” films?

From Breakthrough to The Garden: How will Disney’s acquisition of 20th Century Fox affect “faith-based” films?

Last updated on: March 22, 2019 at 9:48 am by Peter T. Chattaway

From Breakthrough to The Garden: How will Disney’s acquisition of 20th Century Fox affect “faith-based” films? 2019-03-22T09:48:33-07:00 Peter T. Chattaway

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Disney finalized its acquisition of 20th Century Fox this week, and it is estimated that as many as 5,000 people could be laid off as Disney merges the two companies. Deadline reports that one of the more surprising casualties is Fox 2000, the division responsible for critical and box-office hits like Fight Club, Life of Pi and The Devil Wears Prada.

I happened to interview two Fox 2000 executives last year on the Winnipeg set of the “faith-based” movie Breakthrough, which is coming to theatres next month, on April 17 — so I figured I might as well run a few quotes from those interviews now.

The executives who came to the set were Fox 2000 president Elizabeth Gabler and vice president of production Marisa Paiva. Among other things, I thanked them for making Hidden Figures, a film that tackled a number of important social and historical issues in a PG-rated (not PG-13!) package that was eminently suitable for family audiences.

I asked what made Fox 2000 different from 20th Century Fox and Fox Searchlight, and Paiva explained: “The main division is responsible for a certain amount of films to fill the release calendar, whereas at Fox 2000 we just make the movies we love, and that we feel are special. We are kind of known — if there was a line to draw — as the literary-book adaptation division, so obviously between Fault in Our Stars and Life of Pi and Marley & Me and The Devil Wears Prada, those are all major book properties. So Searchlight has a cap on their budgets, that they can only do a certain level, so sometimes when a movie feels a little bit bigger, beyond their means, but is still a very special story that needs to be told and needs some TLC, we take a look at those. But the lines do get blurred between the divisions. ”

Gabler and Paiva both talked about how Breakthrough — which is based on the true story of a teenaged boy who fell into a frozen lake, was clinically dead, and then came back, improbably, to perfect health as his adoptive mother and their community prayed for him — went from script to production very, very quickly.

The project was initiated by DeVon Franklin, a former Sony executive who has made “faith-based” films like Miracles from Heaven and The Star as an independent producer. He brought Breakthrough to Fox in late 2017, and cameras were rolling by March 2018.

“I actually tried to get DeVon years ago to come and work with us at Fox 2000,” said Gabler, “so I kept track of his career and all his accomplishments, and his energy and spirit. So when he asked us to read the script, I read it right away, and said, ‘Let’s do it, let’s do this one together.’ ”

As it happens, production began right around the time I Can Only Imagine came out and became one of the top-grossing “faith-based” films of all time — and that film was still going strong when I visited the Breakthrough set in April 2018. Did the Fox 2000 executives think the success of that film boded well for their own film?

“It was a nice confirmation of what we were already doing,” said Paiva, “but again, this goes back to us in December, me sending script notes on Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve to the writer, so we were already full steam ahead. . . . But yes, everyone is now looking at us with great admiration [for greenlighting Breakthrough] after the success of that film, which is wonderful, and wasn’t on my radar necessarily as a moviegoer.”

One challenge facing “faith-based” films is that they don’t necessarily travel very far outside of the United States. If Box Office Mojo is to be believed, I Can Only Imagine made almost nothing overseas, despite grossing $85.3 million in North America, and Heaven Is for Real — which, with $91.5 million, is the highest-grossing “faith-based” film in North America after The Passion of the Christ — grossed a paltry $9.9 million overseas.

Gabler had hope that Breakthrough could do better, though — partly because the real-life boy at the centre of the story is Guatemalan, which gives it international appeal, and partly because this movie had the promotional muscle of a major studio behind it.

“A lot of [faith-based films] have been made more independently, as opposed to major studios like Fox, that have a global distribution and international, domestic working together fully,” she said. “I think some of the stories have been more rooted in smaller-town American culture, but are maybe not being sold in a bigger, more universal way around the world. This story could happen anywhere.”

Of course, that interview happened almost a year ago, before anyone knew how drastic the changes at Fox would be once Disney acquired the company (as recently as last October, it was reported that Fox 2000 would continue to exist), and it remains to be seen how the studio merger will affect Breakthrough — and other “faith-based” films.

Wikipedia, for its part, says Breakthrough will be the first Fox film distributed by Disney, but yesterday — a few hours before the shuttering of Fox 2000 was announced — the regular Fox publicists here in Canada sent out preview-screening invitations. So for now, the film’s North American release will apparently go ahead as planned, at least.

Beyond Breakthrough, there is also the question of how the Disney deal will affect religious films as a whole. Fox has shown a definite interest in films with biblical content, from those that were popular with Christian audiences (such as Son of God) to those that were not (such as Exodus: Gods and Kings), and about a dozen years ago they experimented with a special division called Fox Faith that released a handful of films theatrically.

More pressingly, it was announced just two months ago that DeVon Franklin, who has a production deal with Fox, was developing a musical about the Garden of Eden that would combine live-action cinematography and photorealistic CGI the way Disney’s most recent version of The Jungle Book did. What will become of that project, now that Disney — a studio with many CGI movies of its own in the works, and a studio that has never been particularly interested in “faith-based” projects (if anything, their adaptations of The Chronicles of Narnia and A Wrinkle in Time have been widely criticized for watering down or outright eliminating the stories’ religious aspects) — owns Fox?

As ever, time will tell. We’ll see.

In the meantime, Breakthrough opens April 17. Stay tuned.

Previous Post

March 20, 2019

Mary Magdalene is finally coming to American theatres

Next Post

March 25, 2019 Michael B. Jordan may play a super-old man in Methuselah

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Anglican Planet Articles BC Christian News BC Report Bible Movies Bible Review Blog Books & Culture Campus Times CBC Radio Christianity Today ChristianWeek Essays Faith Today Festival Cinemas Guide Film Journals Georgia Straight Interviews MB Herald National Catholic Register Salvationist Today's Christian Two Chairs Ubyssey Uncategorized Vancouver Courier Vancouver Sun

Select a Month August 2025 April 2025 January 2025 December 2024 November 2024 May 2024 February 2024 December 2023 May 2023 March 2023 November 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 September 2019 July 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 April 2012 January 2012 January 2011 December 2010 November 2010 October 2010 September 2010 August 2010 July 2010 June 2010 May 2010 April 2010 March 2010 February 2010 January 2010 December 2009 November 2009 October 2009 September 2009 August 2009 July 2009 June 2009 May 2009 April 2009 March 2009 February 2009 January 2009 December 2008 November 2008 October 2008 September 2008 August 2008 July 2008 June 2008 May 2008 April 2008 March 2008 February 2008 January 2008 December 2007 November 2007 October 2007 September 2007 August 2007 July 2007 June 2007 May 2007 April 2007 March 2007 February 2007 January 2007 December 2006 November 2006 October 2006 September 2006 August 2006 July 2006 June 2006 May 2006 April 2006 March 2006 February 2006 January 2006 December 2005 November 2005 October 2005 September 2005 August 2005 July 2005 June 2005 May 2005 April 2005 March 2005 January 2005 December 2004 November 2004 October 2004 September 2004 August 2004 July 2004 June 2004 May 2004 April 2004 March 2004 February 2004 January 2004 November 2003 October 2003 August 2003 July 2003 June 2003 May 2003 January 2003 December 2002 November 2002 August 2002 July 2002 June 2002 May 2002 March 2002 January 2002 December 2001 November 2001 September 2001 August 2001 July 2001 June 2001 April 2001 March 2001 February 2001 December 2000 November 2000 October 2000 September 2000 August 2000 July 2000 June 2000 May 2000 April 2000 March 2000 January 2000 October 1999 August 1999 May 1999 April 1999 February 1999 January 1999 December 1998 November 1998 October 1998 August 1998 July 1998 June 1998 April 1998 March 1998 January 1998 November 1997 September 1997 July 1997 June 1997 April 1997 March 1997 February 1997 January 1997 December 1996 October 1996 September 1996 June 1996 March 1996 February 1996 January 1996 April 1995 November 1994 September 1994 September 1991

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

What food did Jesus multiply to feed 5,000 people?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Bread and wine Grapes and figs Loaves and fish Quail and manna