Hollywood plays to the faithful, finds hits with God

The movie ‘Heaven is for Real‘, which depicts the story of a young boy who claims to have visited heaven during a near death experience, is the fourth faith-based film this year to stir movie-going audiences with impressive box office numbers.

Made for $12 million, the film, which stars Greg Kinnear, collected $21.5 million over the Easter weekend in U.S. and Canadian theaters, finishing third at the box office behind bigger budget films ‘Captain America: The Winter Soldier‘ from Walt Disney and ‘Rio 2‘ from Fox.

Two other Christian-based films also cracked the top 10. ‘Noah‘, from Viacom’s Paramount Pictures, stars Russell Crowe as the biblical figure and was ninth. It has generated more than $93 million at domestic theaters since opening in March, according to the site Box Office Mojo.

‘God’s Not Dead’, about a religious freshman college student who debates his professor over the existence of God, was tenth and has totaled $48 million over five weeks, despite playing in only about half the numbers of theaters of Hollywood’s larger films.

Fox’s ‘Son of God‘, an adaptation of producer Mark Burnett’s 10-hour TV miniseries ‘The Bible’, generated more than $59 million in domestic ticket sales after opening earlier this year. Read More On MSN

Hollywood plays to the faithful, finds hits with God