Tips for Christian Filmmakers – The Three Fundamentals

We here at Sonlight Pictures watch a lot of Christian movies.  It’s part of the gig.  We do it to support our fellow filmmakers and to see what our competition is bringing in the way of production value and innovation.

Through this extensive viewing experience we’ve been noting “lessons learned” from some of the areas these films have done successfully as well as areas for improvement.

We are painfully aware, as fellow filmmakers, just how difficult it is to complete a film, let alone a successful one.  However, we feel that we should always push ourselves to be better with each production and expect the highest standards possible that we can reach.  Over the next few blog entries here we’ll be offering up some advice to fellow Christian filmmakers on key areas of storytelling that are most commonly missing in the current crop of Christian films being made today.

Let’s start with areas that would seem obvious, however, due to budget constraints, can sometimes be harder to achieve than one may think.  They are the Three Fundamentals of Film making.

The three fundamentals of film making are… I need to see it, I need to hear it and I need to believe it.  If any one of these three key elements is missing the film will fail to deliver.

• This means that lighting and direction need to be successful (see it)
• Audio needs to be loud enough, without distracting background noise and words need to be spoken clearly (hear it)
• The story logic needs to make sense and the actors need to be able to relay the emotions and lines effectively (believe it).

Our job as filmmakers is to create a world that the viewer will embrace and within which they will become emotionally involved.  We should avoid any and everything that will pull our audience out of that one moment we’ve spent so many months of writing, shooting and editing to make work. If it’s a bad line reading or a weak visual choice or the story simply doesn’t make sense… any one of these will undermine all of the efforts we’ve done to tell our story.

Alfred Hitchcock was a master, a genius really, when it came to understanding what the audience wanted.  He used this insight to his advantage by choosing when to give an audience what they craved and when to keep things from the audience in order to create suspense.

To understand what I mean, simply watch the scene from The Birds where Tippi Hedren smokes outside the schoolhouse while the birds gather on the jungle gym.  He gives us some information, sets our expectations, then keeps information from us, then when we think we know what’s going to happen next, he surprises us with a result we never saw coming.

Above all else, Hitchcock wanted you to embrace the central character and feel the emotions tied to the obstacles that faced them.  He also understood that if your story does not make sense, if your character makes a decision that the audience would not make, they will turn on the character and actually wish them harm.

For example, if you’re in a house alone and you think there’s a bad guy in the closet, well, you DON’T open the closet!  You run to your neighbor and call the cops.  Opening the closet door is NOT a decision the audience would make.  So, if the character makes a bad decision like that then the audience will lose all connection with the character.  Whatever bad things happen because of the decision, instead of feeling empathy, the audience will respond by saying to themselves “Well, you deserve it!  That’s what you get when you open the closet door!”

Story logic is key.  The story has to make sense.  The characters decisions have to make sense.  This is not a challenge in Christian films alone, but in film making as a whole.  It sounds simple, but not everyone is aware of the general audience expectations.  What makes perfect sense to the lone writer may not make sense to the public at large.

We recently watched a Christian film where the main characters were forced to play a “game” in order to uncover a mystery.  The game conveniently happened to be within the skill set of the main characters.  The problem was that the villain had no legitimate reason for the game to exist in the first place.  It did not benefit the villain or their plans in any way what-so-ever.  It was simply there so that the main characters could participate in the mystery.  We kept watching the story saying “Well, that’s cool and all, but why would the villain do that?  It makes no sense!”

Story logic is the first and most important component in the three fundamentals.  It precedes the making of the film.  It is defined before one figures out how to light it, how to capture the audio, how to direct it and if the actors can pull it off.  Make sure the story works.

Writing is the cheapest part of the film making process.  Take your time and get it right.

Next time…

Don’t tell me, show me.

Where is Our Wealth?

“How hard it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!”

Often times in my youth that line from the Gospel of Mark was used by Pastors to talk about the financial needs of the community and of the parish. It wasn’t given as a direct connection, but more of a bridge toward a conversation between those who have and those who don’t. A twinge of Catholic guilt would also wash over me and make me wonder, in my youthful faith, if making money would condemn me.

A few years ago I was at a mass in a nearby parish and they had a visiting priest from a poor African nation. After hearing this Gospel reading I sat back and said “Uh-oh… here it comes. Get out your wallet.” Then the priest started his homily saying something I never expected…

“This Gospel has nothing to do with money.”

I perked up. “What?” I thought, “but Jesus talks about how rich people can’t enter heaven,” I continued to mutter in my head.

The priest went on to discuss in detail how this Gospel was about those things that get between us and Jesus. For this man, it was money. For others it may be work, or vices or addictions or any number of things. The point Jesus was trying to make was that this person was a good person. He followed the commandments and was trying to understand Jesus’ message. But he could not release that which kept this good person from being a holy person, from reaching salvation.

He also stated that this young rich man was one of the few people, outside of the Apostles, that Jesus personally asked to follow him. He must have been very special indeed.

Yesterday, as this Gospel appeared again on our Liturgical calendar, our local priest, Father Diaz, elaborated further, stating that wealth does not assure condemnation no more than poverty assures salvation. He went on to discuss that in Jesus’ time, the Jews believed that one’s success in life was often tied to God’s blessing. As those with physical ailments, like leprosy, were believed to have such afflictions so that they may pay for their sins or the sins of their ancestors, so too would wealth and success be a sign of God’s graces upon them.

As scandalous as it was for Jesus to heal people, which literally symbolized forgiving their sins, so too was Jesus’ statement that the rich will have a difficult time entering heaven. The apostles were confused… how could wealth, a sign of God’s blessing, impede entry into heaven? Because, it offers too many temptations that block our way.

As Jesus later comments, it would be easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than it would be for a rich man to enter heaven. In its literal sense, this seems impossible. In it’s historical context, it offers a way through the pearly gates, as the eye of the needle was also the name of a small door.  In order for a camel to enter through it, it would require them to remove all of the baggage the camel was carrying and for the camel to get on it’s knees to pass through the door.

Expel our excess baggage. Get on our knees.

Two very practical and possible ways to overcome a seemingly impossible challenge.

So I must remember to always remove that which interferes between me and Jesus, between me and holiness. As Jesus mentioned before, we must do whatever is required, such as cut off our hands, pluck out our eyes, take up our cross, die for our faith… we must do whatever is required of us to remove our baggage, get on our knees and with humility and purity embrace Jesus Christ.

Basking in the Son – Episode 2

Take a listen to our second podcast of Basking in the Son!

Here’s the episode guide:

00:00 – Intro
01:11 – Sonlight Pictures Update
03:10 – Upcoming Christian Films
   03:15 – The Imposter
   07:30 – The Secrets of Jonathan Sperry
12:22 – Christian Film Focus:  Veggie Tales & What’s In The Bible?
18:03 – Interview:  Cathy Ross of the band Messenger
27:28 – Matt Maher On Tour: Alive Again
32:35 – Theater of the Obvious:  Drug Education
37:31 – Closing

Basking in the Son Pics

Here are some pics from host Dorothea Bauer interviewing Lifeteen Band Messenger’s Cathy Ross for our next Basking in the Son podcast.

Messenger is completing their first CD and should have it available for sale soon.

Consequences

Yesterday at church we heard the reading from the Gospel of Mark where Jesus talks about removing whatever you need to remove in order to get into heaven.  If your hand or foot or eye is keeping you from heaven, cut it off or pluck it out.  Better to enter heaven maimed or blind then to not enter heaven at all.

What a powerful thought.

In a very palatable, yet hard to comprehend way, Jesus is saying do whatever it takes, sacrifice whatever you must to get into heaven.  Jesus knew it was not our hands or feet or eyes that were the cause of our sinfulness, but our heart, our weakness and our desires that lead us away from God.

However, to cut to the chase, Jesus makes it extreme.  He made it personal.

Why?  Because the consequence is hell.  Period.

“…it is better to enter into life, maimed, than having two hands to go into hell, into unquenchable fire.   Where there worm does not die and the fire is not extinguished.“

Our actions have immortal consequences.

Adam and Eve refused to sacrifice themselves to obey God and were cast out of Eden.  In order to teach us the value of sacrifice, God made Adam work the land and gave Eve labor pains.  For when we work the land, it may be hard, it may be difficult, but it bears fruit.  Labor pains may be excruciating and tiresome, but the reward is a child of your own creation to which you can embrace with love.

From the beginning God is teaching us sacrifice has rewards.

Jesus came to bridge the gap created by Adam and Eve’s sinfulness and offer us a way back, but he did not obliterate responsibility and consequence.

So, in prayer, we should look at our lives and see what is between us and Jesus?  Is it pride?  Is it greed?  Is it gluttony?  Is it lust?  Are these the feet and hands and eyes that are barring us from heaven?

Wouldn’t it be easy if God were to simply say “Hey, listen, pizza is your downfall.  If you don’t eat pizza again for the rest of your life, you’re in.  One slice however, it’s fire city.”  How simple would it be to remove pizza from your diet?

Unfortunately, it’s not things that are in our way, but our desires and our human failings that weaken us with temptation and open us up to sin.

Sacrifice has rewards.  Actions have consequences.

We should all take an honest look at our lives on a daily basis and remove whatever stands between us and heaven.  It may not be easy, but the alternative is hell.

Let’s pray we all meet up in heaven.   If I am blessed enough to make it, I’ll be the guy with no hands, feet or eyes, but joyful beyond expression.

The Blame Game

There were numerous times in my youth where I’ve wondered why God would allow bad, awful things to happen.  The phrase “if God is all loving, why does He allow evil?” would creep into my head in these weak moments.

Fortunately, I befriended a priest in college, Father John Oliver, who gave me the answer to that very question.  He said “By allowing free will to exist, God allows evil to exist.  The consequence of free will is sin.  The consequence of sin fosters evil.”

Few things hurt me more than to hear people blaming God when bad things happen.  Father Oliver was right, free will allows evil.  If someone decides, of their own free will, to perpetrate evil against me or my family, that is not of God.  It is merely a consequence of God allowing us to have free will.

As a child, if our parents allowed us to play at a playground and we hurt ourselves, would we blame our parents?  No.  What if some other kid pushed us down and hurt us.  Would we blame our parents then?  No.

Then why do we blame God if we are hurt by our own free will or the free will of others?

One of God’s great gifts is the gift of choice.

Love, for example, is always a choice.  As Bishop Fulton Sheen once said, “God calls us to love one another because we can’t always choose who we like… some people just rub us the wrong way.  But, he calls us to love everyone because it is something we must always choose to do.”

The same goes for faith.  Faith is a choice.  It’s very nature is that we believe in something we cannot not completely understand.

And our will is a choice.  We can choose to follow God’s will or our free will.  The consequence of that free will will always be sin.  And that sin may result in bad things happening to good people.

But, let’s not blame God.  He allowed us in the playground.  What we do there is up to us.

“Get thee behind me Satan”

“Get thee behind me Satan.”

How many times do we say that in our lives?  How many times do we recognize Satan’s attempts at influencing our lives?

I remember listening to an interview with a priest who dealt with exorcisms and he spoke in great detail about the battle for souls and demonic influence.  He said most people could barely fathom the war waging for our souls and if the battle were made visible to our eyes, many people would likely go mad.

That is not a comforting thought.

Thankfully, if we embrace the salvation of Jesus Christ, the battle has already been fought and won by God Himself.

Unfortunatley, free will and the resulting sin tempt us off the holy path and into areas such as lust, rage and despair.  Jesus was also tempted by Satan on numerous occasions, so we should expect no less for ourselves.  In the desert before his ministry started, in the Garden before his Passion and with his best friend and follower, Peter, trying to keep him from making the sacrifice he was born to make.

Jesus recognized all of them for what they were… Satan’s influence.  “Get thee behind me Satan.”

When I look at Christians in the film industry, I am often reminded that Satan never gives up.  You can take Mel Gibson, for example.  Gibson overcame tremendous obstacles and challenges to film The Passion of the Christ.  He was attacked at every moment up and through it’s global release in theaters.  But, her persevered.  He did not give up.  He stayed the course and created a film that has, literally, changed lives and redirected souls toward Jesus.

Yet, Satan does not give up.

Years later, in a weakened state, Satan attacked at Gibson’s most vulnerable area… his addiction to alcohol.  He got drunk, said anti-Semitic things and, in many people’s eyes, only validated the rumors about him during the release of Passion and thereby negated the film in their eyes.  He has subsequently divorced his long-wed wife and is fathering a child out of wedlock.

Satan does not give up on us.  He will continue to attack and attack and attack.  If we are not shielded in God’s grace, protected by our own holiness, those demonic influences can weaken us and potentially bring us down.

“Get thee behind me Satan.”

Strong words.  Necessary words for those of us trying to live a Christian life.  For sin always presents itself as a good thing, attractive and potentially harmless.

“If you know you’re going to die, Jesus, by going to Jerusalem, then don’t go!”  Sounds like a good idea, one presented with logic and compassion.  It was, however, a purely human suggestion.  Peter did not yet comprehend the sacrifice Jesus was about to make.

If you read about the lives of the Saints, you will find many of them were not only comforted by angels, but were often attacked by demons.  Saint Padre Pio, who suffered the stigmata, would often get physically attacked by demons and, later, would be nursed back by angels.

The battle is real.  We should not take it lightly.  Human nature is not a surprising thing.  For centuries, mankind has repeated successes and failures.  Demons know this… they know that if they push certain personalities in certain directions at certain times, we are prone to sin.  And they will keep feeding us sin until we either reject it or embrace it.

As Christians lets us follow Jesus’ example and yell “Get thee behind me Satan!”  Let us embrace a holy life, let us ask for heavenly protection and, as is stated in the Lord’s Prayer, ask God to “lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.”

Taking Up Our Cross

“If any man will follow me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.”

What a powerful sentence.  It carries so many messages, so many challenges… First, Jesus sets up the goal… if you want to follow Him, here’s your to do list.

1)  Deny yourself.

Huh?  Did I hear that right?  Deny myself?  What does that mean?  God wants me to deny myself, but He made me this way.  Why would God ask me to deny His own creation?

The reality is that Jesus is not asking us to deny our humanity, but to rise above it.  To choose to make holy sacrifices in the face of human urges and needs.  To forgo pride for humility.  To forgo hunger for fasting.  To forgo anger for forgiveness.  To forgo accumulation of things for giving to the poor.

The path to holiness is through actions of faith, through sacrifice.  Jesus knew he was going to pay the ulitmate sacrifice, His own life.  Therefore, to truly follow Him, to walk in His steps, sacrifice is required and our first sacrifice is to deny ourselves.  To no longer live for this world, but for the next.

Did not the Apostles deny themselves when they dropped their nets and followed Jesus?  These men were no greater, no more holy than we are today.  They were flawed people too.  But, they lived their faith by answering the call and putting Jesus first in their lives above all things.

Okay, denying myself.  That’s a pretty hefty requirement.  Let’s say I can do that… what’s next?

2)  Take up your cross.

The cross.  In practical terms it was the symbol for Roman “justice.”  A common form of lethal punishment inflicted upon the people under Roman reign for the purposes of keeping the peace.  The sight of a cross was nothing new to these men.

In Jesus’ terms, it represents sacrificing your very life, if need be.  I have always been fascinated by the moment where Jesus tells the Apostles “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”  Not only was Jesus telling them of His own eventual death on the cross and resurrection.  He was also telling them of their own deaths.  All of them would become martyrs for the faith, for Jesus.  I always wondered, as they neared that moment of death, if those words echoed in their thoughts and gave them solace.

But what does that mean to me?  Does that mean I have to die for my faith?

Yes, if need be.  If we are successful in following step one, to deny ourselves, then step two would seem a logical step if required to do so.  If I have truly humbled myself, become a servant to the Lord and am living a holy life, then sacrificing your life for those beliefs would seem only natural.

What if I am not meant to die for my faith?  What does taking up my cross mean?

To me, it means two things.  One, to follow Jesus will mean suffering.  He told us the world will reject us.  That rejection has a price, a consequence.  It’s not if we are going to suffer, but when.  That’s the price of being a Christian.

Then what should we do with that suffering?

Secondly, as Jesus showed by example on the cross, we should believe until our very last breath.  We should forgive those who cause us suffering.  We should offer up our pain to God for His glory.  We should do so strengthened by God’s grace, by His love and by His Spirit.

Wow… none of this seems easy.  As a matter of fact, it looks down right difficult.

I guess that’s why Jesus said that path to Heaven is a narrow one.  Not many will have the strength, the faith to travel it.

3)  Then follow Him.

So, after I have denied myself and taken up my cross, only then am I able to follow Him?  Am I ready for such a journey?  How much faith will it require to fight the good fight?

Personally, I think we’ve watered down the price for salvation in our society.  Christianity has become so ingrained with our culture that we’ve started taking it for granted.  Though we may grow up thinking that our journey to Heaven will be effortless and without challenge, Jesus’ own words state the exact opposite.

I hope and pray that my faith remain unwavering in the face of the journey that I must take… that we ALL must take, if we are to truly follow Jesus.

PUSA Pub

Our friends over at the Christian Film Database have been kind enough to show our banners over at their website.  Today as I was popping by I spotted our Purgatory, USA banner with a link to our website. 

Thanks CFDB!  You guys rock.

Balancing Act

As the founder of Sonlight Pictures, making movies has been my passion since I was nine years old and my father brought home a black-and-white reel-to-reel Sony video camera he borrowed from work.  That weekend my brothers and I made the worst Western ever recorded.

Back then being on television was magical.  There were only three networks.  If you were lucky you had a public broadcasting station and maybe an independent station.  Seeing my face on that television screen was amazing.  It changed the course of my life.

Afterwards I spent all of my time watching movies, studying movies, watching documentaries about movies.  I studied acting in high school and got a degree in Fine Arts in college.  I made films on Super 8 and started writing short films.  I bought books on feature screenwriting and story boarding and taught myself how to make movies.  I won some awards, got married and acquired a job in the entertainment industry at a national cable television channel.

Everything I had ever worked for was finally starting to gain momentum.  I could see light at the end of the long, cinematic tunnel.

Then something happened.  I lost time.

I lost time from my wife and from my new-born daugther.  I lost time from my parents and siblings.  I lost time with my faith.  I lost time with the things that matter most in my life… my relationships.

I saw the show business road ahead of me and knew it wasn’t going to get any easier.  I knew that I wouldn’t be sacrificing my career for my family, but the other way around.

And that didn’t sit right with me or my wife.

So,  I left the industry.  We moved back home and I spent the next two years retraining myself to get work in the “real” world.

The transition wasn’t easy and I often questioned God’s plan.  Why give me a passion for something only to take it away from me?  If filmmaking wasn’t my role in the Body of Christ, then what was?

During the off hours from the day job I would still write and make movies, but it wasn’t very satisfying.  I was out of the show business system.  I was the outsider looking in.

Years later, after many jobs and overcoming many challenges, I realized that God’s plan had always been in play and that the end result was Sonlight Pictures.  He’s taken my passion for my faith and my passion for filmmaking and combined it into something greater and more powerful than anything I could have imagined on my own.

So, now that we’ve started Sonlight Pictures, I’m still trying to find that balancing act between family and work.  There are so many things that I want to be doing such as writing or editing, but should that take precidence over my son’s baseball games or my daughter’s driving lessons?

The difference between when I started in the entertainment industry and today is that before it was a career, now, it’s a vocation.  And the one thing for which I am most grateful to God is that illusive gift of time.  For it allows me to grow and learn and become a better follower of Jesus.  Instead of feeling like I am losing time, I now hold onto it and cherish it.  I plan to use these precious moments in my life to find out how to be the best Christian, the best husband, the best father and the best filmmaker I can be, without sacrificing one for the other.

It is still, however, a tough balancing act.  It is something which will continue to challenge me for years to come.