The results are in! The top Dove Approved movies for 2012 were elected by thousands of people voting online. Here are the final winners in each category:

BEST ACTION – The Avengers, Paramount Pictures

BEST ADVENTURE – Life of Pi, Twentieth Century Fox

BEST ANIMATION – Brave, Walt Disney Pictures

BEST COMEDY – Joyful Noise, Warner Bros.

BEST DOCUMENTARY – Chimpanzee, DisneyNature  

BEST DRAMA – October Baby, Provident Films

BEST LIMITED RELEASE – Runaway Slave, Ground Floor Video / Mo Mo Bay

Congratulations to the winning producers and to those of you who voted for your favorite movies. Each of the distributors may use the Crystal Dove Seal award in their marketing and publicity as well as on their DVD/Blu-ray packaging.

This list of winning films says something about the Dove Faith and Family movie audience. They like to be excited, or visually stimulated, or spiritually motivated, or deeply moved. They like to laugh, cry, or love. In fact nothing separates the “faith and family” audience from the rest of society except for one thing; they want their entertainment to fall within a certain set of moral guidelines. 

Studios and filmmakers are just beginning to understand the similarities and distinctions between these two audiences.  The general audience will accept wall-to-wall violence for its own sake. Movie franchises like Mission Impossible, Die Hard, or Borne Identity are examples of violent.  The faith and family audience will tolerate a certain level of violence IF it serves a higher moral or spiritual purpose.  Witness movies like The Passion of the Christ, or The Bible Miniseries airing every Sunday evening in March on the History Channel.  

Another distinction is language. The general audience will usually tolerate the use of “Jesus” or “Christ” or “G..D….” as expletives, whereas the faith and family audience recognizes these words as profanities or blasphemies.

Our latest Film Profitability Study of 2012 proved that over a five year period, the average Dove Family Approved film was 2.5 – 3 times more profitable than all other films released during the same period.

Filmmakers are becoming more aware and respectful of the faith and family audience.  It’s even evident on TV reality shows, where people are replacing “Oh my God!” with “Oh my gosh!”  These are all trends that speak well of the culture and the hope that as a society we are starting to rekindle our sense of civility.

The saying, “The best way to eat an elephant is one bite at a time,” applies to the motion picture industry. Little by little, if Hollywood witnesses more faith and family movies excelling at the box office or on DVD, they will follow the trend and produce more of the same.