You may have heard of Angel Studios, the producer and distributor of Young Washington, a pretty dunderheaded biopic about George Washington as a self-centered but hunky young idiot who redeems himself in battle, which is currently playing in theaters. The film ends with a “special message” from actor Kelsey Grammer, who also appears in Young Washington as a smug British peer who’s making a fortune as an American planter. Grammer makes an incoherent speech about how George Washington represents the true values that are still worth fighting for in the United States, and therefore you should go to the Angel Studios website and click on the QR code (which appears on-screen) and donate money to Angel Studios in order to “pay it forward,” buying tickets for others to see this inspirational movie and make it a big hit.

The whole thing is very odd. But it’s all part of the bold new business plan of Angel Studios, which has allowed it to pump feature films into our entertainment system at a rapid pace. Angel Studios is one strand of the corporate model, which also incorporates the video-on-demand service Angel. The filmmaking plan involves equity crowdfunding, allowing independent investors to buy shares in the company as well as individual film projects. Angel produces “values-based entertainment,” and you can guess what that means after decades of hearing about “family values” from the religious right: G-rated content with evangelical Christian and ultranationalistic themes rah-rah-ing about American exceptionalism and revering the traditional family unit.

Angel Studios is based in Lehi, Utah, and was founded and is run by Mormons — that is, members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (LDS), to use their preferred nomenclature. The LDS Harmon family — four brothers, Neal, Jeffrey, Daniel, Jordan, plus their cousin Benton Crane — began their entertainment ventures with VidAngel in 2013. It provided a service allowing viewers to filter out content they considered objectionable, skipping past or muting scenes of sex, nudity, violence, profanity, and, I have no doubt, religious impiety and political views that contrast with those approved by the LDS church. Sued by various Hollywood corporations — Warner Bros., Disney, Twentieth Century Fox, Lucasfilm — for copyright violations, the Harmons settled out of court, sold VidAngel, and started the Angel Studios and Angel streaming services.