Pilgrim’s Progress
by Michael Foust
Pilgrim’s Progress
Editor: Please insert your publication’s name into the fourth
paragraph.
Caption for photo:
Actors Asger Folmann as Bandy, Patrick Thompson as Vangel, and In-Pyo
Cha as Elder (left to right) in the upcoming film Heavenquest: A
Pilgrim’s Progress. Photo Credit: Robert Ryu/Heavenquest, LLC
Movie based on Pilgrim’s Progress set for 2018 release
By Michael Foust
One of the most legendary and popular books in Christian history soon
will have a big-screen, live-action adaptation.
Heavenquest: A Pilgrim’s Progress is scheduled for release in 2018 and
will feature what director Matt Bilen calls a “prequel” to John
Bunyan’s 1678 fictional classic “The Pilgrim’s Progress,” which has
been translated into 200 languages and is sometimes called the first
English novel. The goal is for Heavenquest to be the first of several
films based on the book.\
The book tells the story of a man named Christian as he makes his ways
from the City of Destruction to the Celestial City and is aided along
the way by multiple characters, including Evangelist. Heavenquest
recounts the backstory of Evangelist.
“We decided to do more of a prequel story, because we don’t just want
to make one movie,” Bilen told the Kansas City Metro Voice News. “We
wanted to build a world like you see in Narnia or The Lord of the
Rings – an epic world. In the book, Evangelist is the wise old sage.
We went back and told Evangelist’s story as if he were a 30-year-old
man and how he became that guy.”
In Heavenquest, Evangelist starts off as a “pretty wicked guy” but
eventually finds his way, Bilen said.
The movie is being made on a budget of under $1 million – pennies by
Hollywood standards – although Bilen says it will be anything but
“cheesy.” To make up for the lack of money, Bilen and the crew focused
on finding “beautiful locations” accompanied by solid cinematography
and a “really good cast,” he said. They then used visual effects to
help “build the world.”
Bilen said he realizes that Christian action movies have a bad name.
“I didn’t want to do one of these cheesy, bad visual effects, bad
music, bad acting films,” he said. “I had no interest in doing that.”
The cast includes actors and actresses who may not be famous in the
United States but are respected in their home counties: South Korea’s
In- Pyo Cha and Ricky Kim, Mexico’s Karyme Lozano, and Australia’s
Peta Sergeant. Among the Americans actors is Alan Powell (The Song and
lead singer of the Christian group Anthem Lights). Bilen hopes the
international cast will give the movie an international appeal.
“When you’re making a fantasy film, sometimes the dialogue can come
across as really cheesy and really clunky,” Bilen said. “I feel like
the performances in this movie are really, really solid.”
It is being released by King Street Pictures, which according to its
website “develops and produces faith-based and faith-inspired genre
films of uncompromising artistry, sensibility and craft.”
“I felt from the beginning that this had to be a beautiful movie to be
taken seriously not just by the faith-based audience but the
non-faith-based audience, too,” Bilen said. “We spent a lot of time to
make sure that will happen.”
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