A History and Overview of Christian Films
The one major element that has always lacked for the dramatic Christian film industry is that there are virtually no Christian movie theaters. Without a theatrical release, it is very hard to get a film known. Hollywood produces a film, puts it in the theater, and this opens up every other door for televison, videos stores, and home viewing.
Since the beginning of christian films back in the 40's, the motion pictures were shot on 16mm film and released mainly to churches. Churches would show films on Sunday nights, for Sunday school, or during youth events. For decades, 16mm films were the main stay of Christian films.
No theater release of a Christian film also meant no awareness. The only people who really knew anything about Christian films were pastors and youth pastors since they were the main people who received mailings about them. From the 1940's to the early 90's, Christian films were distributed primarily through Christian film libraries. These libraries would mail information about films to churches. Churches would then rent films and show them to their particular groups. Therefore, if a person wanted to see a Christian film, their only real option was when a church had a film showing.
Some of the early pioneers of Christian films were producers like Ken Anderson and distributors such as Gospel Films. Harry Bristow started Christian Cinema, possibly the largest Christian film library located outside Philadelphia in Ambler, PA. The Billy Graham Evangelistic Association started producing movies with an evangelistic message in the 50's and have continued to this day.
In the 1972, Mark IV Pictures released A Thief in the Night which was a major landmark for Christian films. One of the most widely seen Christian films of all time, A Thief in the Night began a series of end times films that Mark IV produced which included A Distant Thunder, Image of the Beast, and The Prodigal Planet.
In 1980, the Lord raised up a young filmmaker from California by the name of John Schmidt. Schmidt produced a very popular youth film called Super Christian. Considered one of the finest Christian filmmakers, Schmidt went on to release Kevin Can Wait, The Greatest Story Never Told, The Wait of the World, and Super Christian 2 in the 80's. All of his films were distributed by Gospel Films. Schmidt also produced the convicting drama Guess Who's Coming to America in 1992 and directed The Crossing in 1994.
One of the most widely seen youth films of the 80's was Never Ashamed produced by Edward T. McDougal. Released in 1984, Never Ashamed brought a realistic story to youth groups around the globe. McDougal went on to produce three other films, Gold Through the Fire, Geronimo, and The First Stone.
In 1986, twin brothers Dave and Rich Christiano appeared on the scene with their first film The Daylight Zone. Since that time, the two brothers have either co-produced or individually produced eight other films which include The Pretender, Crime of the Age, The Appointment, Second Glance, Pamela's Prayer, End of the Harvest, Late One Night, Time Changer and Unidentified.
A major evangelistic impact film showed up in 1988 in the form of Mars Hill's Without Reservation. A very contemporary film for its time, Without Reservation caught the attention of many youth pastors who wanted to wake up indifferent youth! The film was written and directed by Fred Carpenter, who two years later released Future Tense, a significant film about the soon coming of Christ.
The advent of secular video in the 80's caught up with 16mm chruch film rentals in the early 90's. Due to several reasons, 16mm film rentals drastically declined so much that by the early 90's film libraries simply went out of business and most producers stopped making films.
The mid 90's proved to be a real dry spell for Christian films. A new filmmaker, Danny Caralles, who wrote the original story to Second Glance, produced his first film, a hard hitting video drama called Final Exit in 1995. He has since released two other films, The Gathering and Escape From Hell. with both films having numerous special effects. Two other strong films that came out in the mid 90's were The Crossing and Invisible Enemies. Both films were stories by Bill Muir.
Kevin Downes, first seen as an actor in The Crossing, has now become a producer with the highly successful end times movie, The Moment After released in 1999. Two years later he released the targeted youth film, Lay It Down.
In 1994, Producer Rich Christiano started putting Christian movies on television with Family Theatre, a program in cooperation with the Family Net Satellite service. This weekly 2-hour program is a dramatic Christ-centered movie series and can be seen in millions of homes each week. It presently airs each week on selected TV stations.
In 1999, Producer Dave Christiano connected with The Inspiration TV Network to start a movie series. The series, called REEL INSP, airs on Saturday nights and is a program showcasing the best Christian movies made for Christ over the years.
Also, some Christian film festivals have been held in certain parts of the country. The most famous one is in the Boston, MA area which was started in 1992 by Tom Saab.
Christian films are available on video through catalog distributors, bookstores, TV, and the internet. Also, some secular video stores are now putting Christian videos in their rental sections.
What does the future hold for Christian films? There seems to be a revival of churches showing movies to their congregation again, as was the mainstay of the industry for the first 50 years. Many churches now are equiped with video or DVD projection. Also, Christian filmmakers have their eyes set on putting real Christian movies in the secular theaters. Time Changer was a very strong, Christ centered movie to play in theaters when it initially released in October of 2002. Although a major challenge, this is the direction some are heading. With the Lord's help, Christian films may become major theatrical releases and impact the entire world even more for Christ. This website, www.ChristianFilms.com, is dedicated to keeping you up to date with these films and filmmakers. Christian films are important and still possibly the most powerful tool for impacting people with the gospel of Jesus Christ.
by Dave Christiano & Barry Bowen
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