Film Tie-ins a Bright Spot
by Jana Riess, Religion BookLine -- Publishers Weekly, 2/7/2007
Expo might have moribund during the day, but the evenings showed some signs of life. Two events were well-attended: premieres for feature films that hit theaters this month.
On Wednesday night, evangelical novelist Francine Rivers and a standing-room-only crowd saw the film adaptation of her 1998 book The Last Sin-Eater starring Academy Award-winning actress Louise Fletcher and Golden Globe nominee Henry Thomas (of E.T. fame). Rivers and producer Michael Landon, Jr., got a standing ovation at the end of the movie; it opens on some 500 screens on February 9.
Tyndale House released a special trade paperback edition of the novel, which includes a full-color inset with movie images. Mavis Sanders, corporate publicist for Tyndale, said the reissue has gone back to press for a second run; the novel now has 193,000 total copies in print.
There will be continued crossover between Christian novels and the big and small screens: Josh Mullenix, marketing manager for Word Distribution, said the Beverly Lewis novel The Redemption of Sarah Cain will be a theatrical release in the fall, and that two of Janette Oke's books also are in various stages of development. (Four of Oke's novels have already been adapted for theatrical or television release.)
On Thursday evening Zondervan and Harper San Francisco co-hosted a screening of Amazing Grace, about the nineteenth-century British abolitionist William Wilberforce.Produced by Bristol Bay, the division of Walden Media that is responsible for grown-up fare, the film releases on February 23, the 200th anniversary of the day the British Parliament abolished the slave trade. ("How Sweet the Sound: Publishers Hitch a Ride on Amazing Grace," RBL, Jan. 3). HSF's Jeff Hobbs spoke about the books Not For Sale and Amazing Grace, and 15-year-old activist Zach Hunter introduced his Zondervan book Be the Change, which deals with the present-day slave trade. (Hunter will be profiled in next the Feb. 21 issue of RBL.)
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