5/14/2008

IMPLODED

There are about 40 million evangelical Christians in the United States.

So far, in four weeks the film ‘Expelled’ has taken in a robust $7,235,324, or about 18 cents for each evangelical. Since a typical matinee ticket is $7.00 or more, even if all the box office was due to evangelicals, less than 1 in 40 evangelicals has bothered to go see this in the theatres. And this is after they offered a significant inducement to churches and schools to attend.

It's kind of a shame. I was planning on taking a group of Bullard kids to see it, but the theatre that was close to our high school dropped it after two weeks in favor of Iron Man. And why not? That film made more money than the ID-friendly film in its opening minute.

It seems fair to guess that "Expelled' will need the DVD market to turn a profit!

3 comments:

Ian said...

Assuming it makes it to DVD - first they have to get past the injunction from the judge in the Yoko Ono case.

Anonymous said...

So perhaps your fears were unfounded?

Scott Hatfield . . . . said...

I was never AFRAID of 'Expelled' as a personal matter, and as a business venture I never thought it would garner much support.

But it is symptomatic of a growing anti-science movement in this country. Slick political operatives have found a formula that appears to buy them time in the political landscape, a formula that always begins by misrepresenting the nature of scientific evidence. Couple this with a religiously-motivated desire to impose belief systems in education, and a growing lack of scientific literacy within the general population, and you've got a recipe for trouble.