Ex-Discovery and AOL Executive Announces Creation of New Christian Film Group
by Staff
September 14, 2007
(christiansunite.com) -- Intending to groom a new generation of Christian filmmakers, high-tech video innovator George Escobar has launched Advent Film Group, LLC (AFG) to train students who will one day direct big-budget films with moral integrity. Expecting this new film production and distribution corporation to carve inroads into Hollywood, Escobar announced the completion of principal photography on AFG's first film, Moot Courting (working title), at Patrick Henry College (PHC) in Purcellville, Virginia."Our mission is to change culture for Christ through media," Escobar said, noting how homeschoolers will play a key role.
"We are drawing from the outstanding talent and strength of the homeschooling community," he said. "If homeschoolers can turn the public education monopoly upside down, they can do the same for cinema."
High profile homeschooling advocates, Dr. Michael Farris, founder and Chancellor of PHC (the nation's only Christian liberal arts college established to serve homeschooled students), PHC President Dr. Graham Walker, and Michael Smith, President of Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA), have endorsed and enthusiastically support Advent.
Escobar says Advent is a response to an increasingly unprincipled film industry making "fuzzy faith-based" movies, as well as to the distressing lack of qualified Christian filmmakers needed to fill key positions as directors of big budget movies.
Case in point: Amazing Grace and The Chronicles of Narnia, two successful Christian-themed movies, were both directed by secular filmmakers. Though legions of Christians working in the industry were available, apparently none could be entrusted to direct major motion pictures.
"As a Christian community, we have not done our job to raise up superbly qualified, born-again film directors," Escobar observes.
A born again believer and homeschooling dad, Escobar is a former American Film Institute Producing Fellow and recent VP of Product Development for Discovery and Executive Director for AOL Video. Citing the success of Facing the Giants, a film made for $100K that earned $10 million in box office sales and sold over 1 million DVDs, Escobar says new digital technologies give independent filmmakers a foothold in an industry ruled by multimillion dollar budgets. The timing is right, he believes, for skilled Christian filmmakers to impact the market.
"Our budgets are 'right-sized' to our self-distribution campaign and network," explains, Escobar. "It's sustainable."
AFG's three-year plan includes producing five films touching on themes with a biblical worldview important to family audiences. Participants will eventually direct future films on the AFG production slate, found at www.adventfilmgroup.com.
