FamilyLife Culture Watch

Fireproof has big opening weekend box office

The buzz coming into opening weekend for Fireproof gave every indication that the box office numbers would be substantial. Many of the biggest talk shows were featuring the movie or interviews with lead actor Kirk Cameron. Fireproof ranked number one in online ticket sales on Fandango. Churches around the country were encouraging congregations to attend.

So how did it compare with other movies in theaters including other movies debuting this weekend?

Number 4 in box office receipts behind Eagle Eye (debut), Nights in Rodanthe (debut), and Lakeview Terrace, and ahead of Burn After Reading.

Number 4 movie in per-theater receipts behind The Duchess, Appaloosa, and Eagle Eye, and ahead of Nights in Rodanthe)

Number 12 all time among Christian movies. Given the buzz behind this movie, Fireproof is likely to finish its run in theaters as high as number 4, behind only The Passion of the Christ, and the two Chronicles of Narnia movies. By comparison, Facing the Giants (the previous film by Sherwood Pictures and Stephen and Alex Kendrick) holds the number 10 spot.

Number 12 on Amazon. The Love Dare book (actually created from the plot element of the movie) is soaring on the bestseller book charts.

To give a comparison at how well Fireproof did on opening weekend, its $6.5 million box office gross looks paltry compared to Eagle Eye at $29.2 million, Lakeview Terrace at $25.7 million, and Nights in Rodanthe at $13.6 million. But consider that those blockbuster films cost in the tens of millions to make, while Fireproof's budget was just $500,000, and you get a different perspective. And Fireproof was only in 839 theaters, compared to 2,400-3,600 for the other three.

If you want a comparison with Facing the Giants, that movie premiered almost exactly two years ago in about half as many theaters as Fireproof and made only about one-fifth as much on opening weekend. It took Facing the Giants more than five weeks to haul in as much money as Fireproof had on its first three days. Hopefully, Fireproof will have the longevity of it's Sherwood Pictures predecessor, which stayed in theaters another 16 weeks and garnered another $9.8 million.

As of this writing, few critics have taken a shot at Fireproof yet, and the user reviews are mixed.

Worth a Parade: Most marriages are happy

The evidence is everywhere. Half as many divorces each year as marriages, high-profile couples breaking up, cohabitation on the rise. Judging from the media coverage, you would think that marriage is an institution on its deathbed.

But results of a new national poll appearing in last week's Parade Magazine tells quite a different story. In their special commissioned report, "The Truth About American Marriage," Parade notes that 7 of 8 couples in the U.S. were happy or reasonably content in their marriage. Only seven percent claimed to be in a marriage that was unhappy or hostile. And three fourths claim to have reasonably fulfilling sex lives, even though more than 30 percent reported being physically intimate less than once a month.

Not all of the results were rosy, though. One in nine women and one in five men had been unfaithful to their marriage partner. And 30 percent of men and half again as many women think about leaving their spouse.

Here are some highlights of the survey:

Marital Permanence:

• More than one third have been married more than once
• More than one third have been married more than 20 years
• Nearly three fourths attributed companionship or deep love for their marriage lasting, and more than 60 percent mentioned living up to a commitment

Relationships:

• Well over half were satisfied with their level of communication.
• Finances and chores were the most likely points of disagreement, followed by sex

Sex:

• Three-forths of both men and women reported satisfaction with their sex lives
• Six in 10 men were satisfied with the frequency of sex; For women it was 50/50.
• Nearly half of men said they didn't have sex more often because their wife wasn't interested; One third of women said they were too tired

Affairs:

• More than two-thirds of those who have never had an affair cite commitment to their mate as the  main reason
• Of men who had affairs, six in 10 had been with more than one partner; 55% of women had limited their infidelity to just one person
• More than half said they would confront their spouse and try and save the marriage if they found out they had been unfaithful. About 30 percent of men and 40 percent of women would leave immediately or consider divorce

Satisfaction:

• 57 percent said they were happy with their marriage, and another 30 percent were satisfied
• 5 in 9 said they would definitely marry their spouse again; another 28 percent of men and nearly a fourth of the women said they probably would
• More than 8 in 10 said they married for love; 40 percent also said it was because the time was right

A Fireproof marriage: Kirk Cameron on Today Show

By Scott Williams

The movie, Fireproof, which premiers tomorrow (Friday, September 26) nationwide is receiving a lot of positive advance publicity from the mainstream media. One of the most encouraging was an NBC Today Show interview with the movie's star, Kirk Cameron. Interviewers Hoda Kotb and Kathie Lee Gifford were close to swooning with everything Cameron said about marriage, commitment, and working through relationship difficulties. Both seemed to be responding not so much as interviewers, but instead as women who love to be loved. This movie seems to have found a soft spot.

Of all the topics  that the Today Show interview segment addressed, the highlight was about Kirk Cameron's conviction not to kiss another woman other than his wife, even on screen. So for a powerful scene at the end of the Fireproof, lead actress Erin Bethea stepped out and her body double, Chelsea Cameron, stepped in to do the scene in silhouette.

Watching the segment, I was struck at the response of Kotb and Gifford to this very un-Hollywood movie on marriage. It's the kind of message that usually resonates with mainstream Americans while drawing the smug comments and disdainful reviews of movie critics. Granted, Fireproof is still a bit short of Hollywood's moviemaking quality, but its positive marriage message is something that Hollywood can take some serious lessons from.

As a polished movie, Fireproof is probably a 6 or 7. As a message, it's a 10. But it seems in these days of uncertainty about marriage, most people would be willing to give up a bit of entertainment quality for a strong dose of encouragement.

Are working mothers going home?

By Scott Williams

Beginning in the mid-1960s, the number of women in the job market saw a marked increase. In fact, in the 20 years from 1969 to 1989, the number of married mothers in the labor market jumped from just under 39 percent to just over 70 percent.

A recently released research study in the Journal of Economic Perspectives notes that the rapid increase began to moderate in the 1990s and now notes a modest reversal of working moms.

One of the most interesting phenomena noted in the report is from the youngest group of women (not just mothers) who have entered the workforce. Those born from 1976-1985 initially followed their older peers, with better than 75 percent participation in the labor force at age 25. However, while the older peer group stayed steady in the labor force through their late 20s, this younger group has shown a sharp decline past age 25.

Covenant Marriage: Revival in the choir

By Scott Williams

In 1997, the Louisiana Legislature started what many hoped to be a countercultural revolution in marriage by creating the first legal Covenant Marriage option. Couples who married in the state could opt to place themselves under a new statute that allowed divorce only in the case of adultery, physical or sexual abuse, abandonment or imprisonment. They also agreed to receive counseling before the wedding and in the event that they had marital difficulties.

Bayou State couples were still free to choose the standard marriage license, allowing them to divorce for any reason, including irreconcilable difference. Since then, both Arkansas and Arizona have followed with similar covenant marriage laws in addition to the state standard.

In her recent On the Family column, Washington Times writer Cheryl Wetzstein reported on a recent study of Louisiana couples, revealing that those with covenant marriage licenses divorced half as often as those who chose the standard marriage statute.

The study, conducted by researchers from Bowling Green State University, the University of Central Florida and the University of Virginia,

involved about 600 couples, half with covenant marriages and half with standard marriages. The 1,200 husbands and wives were interviewed as newlyweds and at the two-year and five-year marks.

By the end of the study, 8.6 percent of covenant couples were divorced, compared with 15.4 percent of couples with standard marriages.

On its face, it seems like good news and the start of a trend. But as the study authors and Wetzstein both admit, current covenant marriage laws are likely to make little more than a dent in the national divorce epidemic. Here are some reasons:

• The covenant marriage in all three states is optional, and two percent or less are choosing it. That would amount to an infinitesimal fraction of one percent of all the nation's marriages
• Those who choose this super marriage option are likely to do so because of existing beliefs. The researchers found that those who opted for the covenant marriage were more likely to avoid ideas and behaviors that endanger marriage: they "were more likely to be religious and believe in lifelong marriage, and less likely to have cohabited before marriage or have any children."
• "[C]ovenant marriage has been opposed by progressives, conservatives, feminists, traditionalists and religious leaders, although for very different reasons," Ms. Sanchez and her co-authors wrote.

Add the fact that no-fault divorce—the law of the land in nearly every state—allows one couple to end a marriage simply because he or she wants out, and you can see that our culture is far from adopting marriage as a lifelong commitment between a man and a woman to grow in oneness.

Opt-in covenant marriage laws in just three U.S. states is really more of a symbol than a trend, but it is a starting point, as Wetzstein writes to conclude her column.