Did you know that the “Rocky” movie franchise was really all about Christian values? Did you know that Sylvester Stallone is a committed Christian and has been all along? Did you know that the final movie in the franchise, “Rocky Balboa,” is coming out and the same people who brought you the Christian marketing for “The Passion of the Christ” and “Chronicles of Narnia” are now doing the same for “Rocky Balboa”?
Apparently, they expect churches to start shilling for Sly’s new movie. This is evidently the fallout of the “Passion” Effect in Hollywood, where every movie is now a Christian movie and churches are reduced to doing free marketing for the movie industry.
The marketing weas… folks are offering special screenings for churches, leaders’ guides to “help in creating lively discussions about faith themes” in the movie, and you just know that canned homilies using themes from the movie aren’t far behind.
I don’t know if I’m disturbed by the crass commercialization of faith or amused by the fact that Hollywood doesn’t see how transparent they are.
Anyway, you can see 60-year-old Stallone get back in the ring on December 22. (Here’s an interesting fact: When the new movie was filmed, Stallone was only 8 years younger than Burgess Meredith was in the first “Rocky” film.)
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