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EXCLUSIVE: We all know post-pandemic that tentpoles work at the box office, but it’s been hit and miss for everything else, especially indies movies. From out of nowhere, Angel Studios’ Sound of Freedom movie about Tim Ballard, a former Homeland Security agent who left the department after he was frustrated with the U.S. rescue efforts with trafficked children in third world countries, is racking up $7.2M in ticket presales before its July 4th opening at 2,626 theaters, sources tell Deadline.
Angel is known for its faith-based fare, and I’m told this movie has some elements of that, though not entirely. Clearly a nerve has been struck with that demo as presales here are well in advance of Lionsgate’s spring Christian hit, Jesus Revolution, which opened to $15.8M. Rivals are indeed impressed by the amount of presales here for Sound of Freedom, especially since it’s a non-major studio movie. Another draw here for faith-based moviegoers is that Sound of Freedom stars Passion of the Christ thespian Jim Caviezel as Ballard. Oscar winner Mira Sorvino also headlines as well.
Ballard founded Operation Underground Railroad back in 2013, which has conducted several sting operations to rescue children, some outside the United States, and donated technological and funds to law-enforcement agencies that combat sex trafficking.
The film is opening on Independence Day given its patriotic themes.
The movie directed by Alejandro Monteverde, which he co-wrote with Rod Barr, was in the works at 20th Century Fox International pre-Disney merger. Producer Eduardo Verástegui wound up buying the film back and approached Angel, which was recently behind the Easter indie pic, His Only Son about the prophet Abraham which opened to $5.5M and did over $12M domestic.
Angel Studios live-tracks their presales, now at 624K-plus as of this post. The distrib has a goal of selling 2 million tickets per Sound of Freedom‘s Tuesday opening, which reps the number of kidnapped children in the world. Angel crowdfunded $5M for P&A expenses on Sound of Freedom, part of that policy is awarding their donators with 120% return. They executed a similar crowd-funding-marketing plan on His Only Son and I’m told they just cut checks to their donators.
It remains to be seen how the grosses play out here; faith-based audiences are big advance ticket buyers, however, this is nonetheless a heartbeat for the non-tentpole sector of the box office.
Here’s the trailer to the movie: