Al Gore goes looking for “Passion dollars”

Ever since The Passion of the Christ (2004) came out of nowhere and conquered the box office, Hollywood has been looking for ways to rake in more of those “Passion dollars“.

Now, says the Hollywood Reporter, former U.S. Vice President Al Gore is pursuing this market on behalf of his global-warming documentary An Inconvenient Truth:

“What we have found about this movie is (that) the word-of-mouth gets people to come in and see it and bring others to come see it,” Gore said.

The film’s marketing team will take a page from “The Passion of the Christ” and “The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch & the Wardrobe” and target the faith-based groups that helped make those pictures box office hits. Gore said Paramount also will pursue environmental and business groups to boost awareness of the Davis Guggenheim-directed documentary.

There are, of course, other factors at work here besides the purely commercial quest for “Passion dollars”. Environmentalists have been wooing evangelicals for some time, hoping to use their political clout; and recent evangelical environmental campaigns have been overseen by Fenton Communications, the firm behind MoveOn.org, which also teamed up with Al Gore to promote the environmentally-themed blockbuster The Day after Tomorrow (2004; my review). So there are some links there already.