Last year, during the Toronto International Film Festival, the filmmakers behind The Promise premiered their film before an audience of 1,500 and were met with a standing ovation. Yet at the same time, the film was being given thousands of single-star reviews through IMDb.
Films should always be given a chance and many times, given internet culture, people unfairly and impulsively despise or support films. This concerted effort looked different than a trending issue for the internet&#8217;s next bandwagon. The negative reviews, which climbed to a massive 85,000 before the film was even released, looked like clear sabotage. It came to light this was a cyber plan put together by the Turkish government and executed through a horde of internet trolls.
With enough negativity, any critical response can bury a film and wreck its release. Look at last year&#8217;s flop, The Light Between Oceans, which had many bad reviews premature to its release, thus steering audiences away. To similar effect, the Turkish government&#8217;s intent with The Promise was to ruin the release because they claim the movie propagandizes a false history.

The Promise is an epic drama that tells the tragic and appalling story of the Armenian Genocide. During WWI, the Republic of Turkey and all of the surrounding nations existed as the Ottoman Empire. The empire was a Muslim Turkish majority but there were multiple minorities of Christians in the state, predominantly the Armenian population.
During World War I, the Ottoman Empire started to destabilize; the days of sultans ruling the nation came to an end as a radical, new political party called the Committee of Union and Progress, known as The Young Turks, came into power. They preached reforming the Empire&#8217;s political structures from a monarchial system to a democratic, constitutional government. The Committee&#8217;s agenda was to create a government by the people and for the people in order to achieve more liberty.
The Armenian inhabitants were initially excited about the big changes but The Young Turks were a nationalistic group; their meaning of &#8220;the people&#8221; didn&#8217;t include everyone. The Young Turks&#8217; perspective of reuniting the Ottoman Empire was returning it to the former glory days of being a purely Muslim nation.
Since Armenians represented the largest number of Christians in the country, the plan to exterminate the Christian faith largely targeted them. This plan included: removing Armenians from their villages, looting their property and other belongings, kidnapping their children and converting them to Islam, and most poignantly, forcing them into death marches &#8211; a military-implemented walk out of the country. If they fell behind, they were gunned down by Turkish troops.
The Turks committed the first recorded genocide of the modern era. Records show a wide variance of just how many lives were lost from this death sentence but the commonly-used figure is roughly 1.5 million Armenian deaths. These deaths are denied by modern-day Turkey; just as shockingly, they&#8217;re not even recognized by many other countries around the world.
Even in the U.S., many Americans have learned little to nothing about this tragedy. This is likely in part due to our political relationship with Turkey. Turks were insulted by the U.S. resolution to mark April 24 a day to remember and observe the Armenian genocide. Turkey&#8217;s foreign ministry responded it &#8220;distorts history and law&#8221; and &#8220;We condemn those who led this prejudiced initiative.&#8221;
The pain and trauma of the Armenian genocide can never be fully eased. The Armenian community has been forced to scatter from their geographical origins, which has severed their connection as a people. Three million Armenians currently live in Armenia while 8-10 million live in other places around the globe. It&#8217;s a permanent trauma most of us recognize in the experiences of the Jewish people throughout all of human history. Sorrowfully, it&#8217;s also a trauma we&#8217;re seeing in real time permanently inflicting the Syrian people.
Certainly the greatest way to perpetuate extreme Armenian past traumas is other cultures and countries not acknowledging this genocide. And this is where The Promise enters. The film focuses on an epic love story blossoming during World War I, in the city of Constantinople. Oscar Isaac plays Mikael, a small-town Armenian who&#8217;s come to the multicultural capital to learn medicine and return to his town as a doctor. Soon after he arrives, he meets the lovely Ana, portrayed by Charlotte Le Bon. She&#8217;s a fellow Armenian that has been drawn back to the Ottoman Empire after spending many years in Paris. Joining Ana from Paris is her lover Chris, an American journalist, played by Christian Bale, who is sniffing out the changing of the tides as the Ottoman Empire joins the world war. The three of them are tangled in a nuanced love triangle and wrapped up in the crisis facing the Armenians; they must fight to survive and do everything they can to protect the endangered Armenians as they witness a genocide that forever changes history.
The Promise is a serious milestone because, believe it or not, it is the first major motion picture to be made about the Armenian Genocide. The last attempt was in the 70s with a film called The 40 Days of Musa Dagh, based on the best-selling book of the same name which was developed at MGM. The film never got off the ground because as it gathered steam for production, the Turkish Ambassador visited the producers in Hollywood and effectively stopped the film.
The Armenian Genocide has, to the best of Turkey&#8217;s abilities, been concealed, understated, and ignored for the past 100 years. So The Promise is an achievement. Is it a masterpiece of raw, cinematic storytelling? No. But it&#8217;s a very well-made movie with serious talent behind it, though it does not fully elicit the feeling of the political climate and Armenian experience during those times. For example, the movie doesn&#8217;t show us the motivations of The Young Turks and it doesn&#8217;t fully define the tense inequality the Armenians were living through many years prior to the genocide.
The film does effectively tackle the complexities of the war crimes committed during the genocide, including some of the Turkish people depicted in the film being unable to cope with the evils against the Armenian people.
In the movie as well as historically speaking, we see Turks defy the empire to protect their neighbors in danger. Director and co-writer Terry George&#8217;s use of Christian Bale&#8217;s character, Chris, to symbolize the fight to legitimize this genocide to the rest of the world and to preserve this dark moment in history, not letting it go undocumented at any cost, adds power to the film.
The film should be seen because it&#8217;s a historical event that needs to be more widely known; if this film is successful, it will usher in more art capturing this calamity. With its sweeping scope and talented performers, The Promise sets a standard. As Forward.com&#8217;s Jake Romm alluded to in his review of the film, producing Schindler&#8217;s List set the bar for telling stories revolving around the Holocaust. Two years ago, the widely-acclaimed film Son of Saul was released; critics called it one of the most powerful and brutal films ever made about the Holocaust. But many films tackled the subject matter before Son of Saul would be a successful game changer. The same evolution should be birthed from The Promise.
It has become commonplace to call all films tackling relevant issues &#8220;Important Films&#8221; but The Promise is indeed an &#8220;Important Film,&#8221; as it takes the first step for more awareness, learning, and acknowledgment of the horrific tragedy. In a very dramatic and poetic way, the Turkish attempts to make The Promise go unseen, and therefore unsuccessful, symbolizes where we stand with the Armenian Genocide itself. Speaking and knowing the truth about it is key and if we can all do that, we can help build a way to further resolve the past for the Armenian community, and alert the world that such genocidal acts should never be tolerated.
Check out the trailer below:
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The Promise is playing in theaters now. It&#8217;s directed by Terry George and written by <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0313623?ref_=tt_ov_wr">Terry George</a> and Robin Swicord, starring Oscar Isaac, Charlotte Le Bon, and Christian Bale.

‘The Promise’: A Film Has Finally Been Made About The Armenian Genocide And You Need To Watch

Christian Bale

Turkey

As the tagline proclaims, <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2950418/">Greater</a> tells the incredible true story of dreamer Brandon Burlsworth who set his mind to joining the University of Arkansas Razorbacks &#8212; and through great effort and commitment, accomplished just that. The odds were against him and nobody was looking his way. Even his peers saw an innocent kid who just didn&#8217;t understand why he couldn&#8217;t make it in college football, and certainly not the NFL. But as Marty Burlsworth, Brandon&#8217;s older brother and companion through it all, emphasized in an exclusive interview with The Daily Wire, Brandon made his football goals happen because he was relentless. When he set his mind to something, you better believe you were going to witness him do it.
Brandon&#8217;s exceptional journey came to an abrupt, tragic end when a devastating car crash took his life, shocking his hometown, the state of Arkansas, and the national football community. Brandon&#8217;s short-lived career involved true honor and character, and thanks to the new film, his legacy will go further and live on as a model for others. Along with Brandon&#8217;s rise, Greater equally focuses on the loss experienced by Brandon&#8217;s family, especially his brother Marty, and the questions about God&#8217;s goodness that are stirred by the heartache and grief.
Marty Burlsworth tells us about bringing the story of Greater to the screen, his relationship with Brandon, and making one&#8217;s way through understanding and accepting God in times of crisis.
What was your first thought when someone approached you about making &#8220;Greater&#8221;? Had you ever thought of Brandon&#8217;s story as a film?
<blockquote>
It always seemed like a movie to me. Especially after it was all over and, you know, that was bad times. Not good at all. But&#8230; me and&#8230; friends that were close to me were like &#8220;This is like a movie. It&#8217;s unreal.&#8221; But, you know, how would you make it where it wasn&#8217;t basically depressing.
So we had talked to a group or two out of California that had pitched the idea but we just never were at peace or had any comfort. They couldn&#8217;t give us any assurances that there wouldn&#8217;t be a lot of &#8220;Hollywood&#8221; going into it. Anything that wasn&#8217;t right, wasn&#8217;t real, wasn&#8217;t what Brandon was about. And we were concerned that his faith would take a big backseat&#8230;And we just weren&#8217;t up for that at all. And then we were approached 11 years ago by Brian Reindl who&#8217;s the producer- who had no experience in the filmmaking industry at all but had a passion for it. And I was equally impressed with Missy, his wife&#8230; [They] live in Fayetteville and they drove over to Harris to meet with us and she said &#8220;Whatever he sets his mind to, he gets done&#8221;&#8230; that resonates with me because that was like Brandon. You take care of it, you get things done. So that was kind of the stamp of approval there, plus they&#8217;re Christians and they didn&#8217;t want to lose that faith aspect. So we really did have a good comfort level with them plus the agreement with Brian and them having the movie made was that the family would have some &#8220;say so&#8221; if something wasn&#8217;t just right as far as the script goes and things like that and they&#8217;ve kept us in the loop all along. We&#8217;ve felt like we&#8217;ve been very involved and kept up to date on what was going on&#8230; and we&#8217;re very happy with the outcome.
</blockquote>
So because you and your close ones felt like this story could be a film, did you make that known and/or start looking for filmmakers to bring it to life?
<blockquote>
No, we just kind of kept that to ourselves. It just seemed like it was just a storybook thing&#8230;with a &#8212; at that time &#8212; just seemed like a bad ending&#8230; It&#8217;s such a great story, how can it be told, you know? Where it doesn&#8217;t have such a bad ending? But [the death was] not the ending&#8230;
We weren&#8217;t proactive at all in [making a movie]. It was just something that we thought of, you know. And then&#8230; apparently that thought process was also out there in California&#8230; we did hear from some that approached us but one thing I wasn&#8217;t 100 percent sure [of] was the commitment level over there which was why when Reindl&#8217;s wife said &#8220;[when] he sets his mind to it, he gets it done&#8221;, you know, I&#8217;ve always heard that in Hollywood [scripts] can sit on the shelf forever. Even an idea, you know&#8230;a script can sit on the shelf and never see the light of day. So you didn&#8217;t know if that was going to happen but that wasn&#8217;t really the main [concern]. The main [concern] was that it was going to go somewhere that really never happened. If there was anything inappropriate in it, of course that was all made up. We didn&#8217;t want that&#8230; Sports Illustrated did a feature piece on Brandon. I think it was in June [1999]&#8230; I think [that&#8217;s] kinda when that started. The phones calls started coming right after that.
</blockquote>
What were the vital elements that you knew had to be involved in the movie, no matter who made it, in order to fully capture Brandon&#8217;s life?
<blockquote>
Well if you had taken God out of it, it [would&#8217;ve] been fiction. His faith is&#8230; what he relied on. It&#8217;s what he leaned on to work as hard. There were&#8230; many times&#8230; I know it was tough. I know it was hard. I would talk to him most every night. He&#8217;d call me or I&#8217;d call him and we would talk about what practice was like that day. He&#8217;d tell me what it was like but&#8230; he&#8217;d never say &#8220;it was really hard and I&#8217;m not sure I can do this&#8221;. He would just say &#8220;Yeah we did this, we did this, we did this&#8221; and it was just like &#8220;this is what we&#8217;re doing&#8221;, you know&#8230; he never [said] &#8220;I can&#8217;t do this.&#8221; That just wasn&#8217;t there because, you know, that&#8217;s where his faith led him. He knew he could.
</blockquote>
In the film, we see a lot of moments where the Marty character is learning from the persistence and drive of Brandon. How is the dynamic in reality versus how its shown in the film?
<blockquote>
Some of that was a little bit of filmmaking and&#8230;we were fine with it. In the movie I&#8217;m learning from Brandon and I think we&#8217;ve all learned from Brandon but&#8230; I was right there by his side all the way, you know, backing him and supporting him as far as what he was doing in school and football and the challenges. &#8230; I think the overall message of the film is we can learn from this and my character in the movie&#8230; may not be 100 percent the way it is or the way it was, but that doesn&#8217;t really matter. It&#8217;s a good story and, you know, Neal McDonough struggling in the aftermath that&#8217;s absolutely true. It&#8217;s condensed. They put it in more of a condensed form which is the way filmmaking generally always happens. 
But that first year after Brandon&#8217;s accident, that was- for the whole family, [especially] my mother and me- I mean it was just&#8230; it was unreal. For someone who had worked so hard and not only did he work so hard, but [for] the family to be backing him and supporting him and talking to him everyday and seeing him everyday and [him] moving on and going on to greater things and then for that to- boom- [and be] over. That was very very tough&#8230;
 &#8230;I&#8217;ve heard the director say many times &#8220;what we&#8217;ve done is [put] that [whole] first year [after the accident] in Neal&#8217;s piece in this movie. That first year has been put into the way it comes off on screen&#8230; his feelings and the way he&#8217;s taking it&#8221; and I mean it was a rough time and anyone that&#8217;s had a family member that&#8217;s passed unexpectedly or too soon&#8230; can relate to that.
</blockquote>
Greater is a very emotional movie and it deals with figuring out your faith in times of grief and loss. Was there anything that you had to do for yourself spiritually or emotionally to prepare for the making of this movie?
<blockquote>
In the making of [the movie], sometimes we were able to be on set&#8230; some days they didn&#8217;t want us there and we didn&#8217;t want to be there. When the producer says &#8220;Today is probably not a good day [to be on set]&#8221;, that&#8217;s all he has to say. We won&#8217;t be there. Because we don&#8217;t want to be there- that close-&#8230; to some scenes that&#8217;ll be tough to watch even being filmed. As far as Brandon goes and reliving everything- through his foundation we&#8217;ve always kept his memory alive and his example out there for kids ever since his accident. You know, we established his foundation shortly thereafter [the accident]. So that makes it quite a bit easier to revisit because we&#8217;ve never really gone away. Some of the tougher scenes, you know, that&#8217;s a little different. That&#8217;s pretty tough.
</blockquote>
From anyone who is struggling with God because of a loss they&#8217;ve faced, especially one as devastating as a close family member, what wisdom would you share with them?
<blockquote>
[To] anyone who&#8217;s struggling with their faith when something catastrophic happens, I guess the best thing I can say is- to me- that&#8217;s somewhat normal. I mean it was for me. And I don&#8217;t want to say [it means] you&#8217;re angry at God. I don&#8217;t think I got there.
But I remember going back to church&#8230;close after the accident and after the death had settled a little bit. And in Arkansas it was a statewide tragedy. It was all over ESPN. I mean everybody knew. Everybody knew&#8230;
[W]e went back to church services and I had a friend&#8230;[who] was going to lead a song or two and he started out with [a song saying] &#8216;God is good&#8217; and you know &#8216;God is so good to me&#8217; and I&#8217;m thinking&#8230; man, I cannot believe you&#8217;re singing that with me in the building&#8230;that&#8217;s where my mind was then. So I think it&#8217;s normal. It just takes some time. You don&#8217;t lose your faith&#8230; I had struggles because [I&#8217;d think] &#8216;why?&#8217;, you know. Why? Always why. And I know&#8230; a lot of good has come out of it and I think a lot of good is going to continue to come out of it and only grow what we&#8217;re [doing] through this film and through Brandon&#8217;s foundation, &#8230; to impact a lot of kids for many years.
</blockquote>
Greater reflects that relentless energy we need in order to be the best people we can and, at times, to push further than anyone suspects we can go. Greater is currently playing in theaters and stars Neal McDonough, Christopher Severio, and Leslie Easterbrook.

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EXCLUSIVE: Interview with Marty Burlsworth of New Faith-Based Film ‘Greater’

Christianity

Hollywood

Religion

Sports

The new Disney film <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt4341582/">Queen of Katwe</a> is a true story about the missionary work of Robert Katende with children of impoverished communities in Uganda. The film focuses on the ways in which Katende&#8217;s Christian outreach transformed the life of a young girl named Phiona Mutesi.
Mutesi wandered into Robert&#8217;s ministry because she was hungry, but what she discovered was joy and purpose in her life, thanks to Katende&#8217;s mentorship and compassion.
Oscar-winner <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm2143282/?ref_=tt_cl_t1">Lupita Nyong&#8217;o</a>, who actually works with relief organizations for mothers and children in Uganda and other impoverished areas, and Golden Globe nominee <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0654648/?ref_=tt_cl_t2">David Oyelowo</a>, who&#8217;s most known for his portrayal of Martin Luther King Jr. in <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1020072/?ref_=nm_flmg_act_11">Selma</a> and is a devout Christian himself, star in Queen of Katwe and underscore the importance of the film&#8217;s story in this new featurette.

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As the real life Robert Katende says in the featurette, &#8220;Being a man of faith, it is God&#8217;s purpose that I live, not my own.&#8221; A founding principle of Christianity is dying to oneself and caring for others. Robert embodies these values and this September 23rd, Queen of Katwe will demonstrate how this powerful belief system has and will continue to change the world. 
The second official trailer of the film below:

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Disney’s New Film Shows the Power of Christianity to Improve the Third World

Disney

Screenwriters Chad and Carey Hayes (The Conjuring, The Reaping, House of Wax) are back to scare the hell out of us with their second installment in The Conjuring franchise, The Conjuring 2. Their chilling new film follows the famous demonologists Ed and Lorraine Warren on another battle against dark supernatural forces. This time the church sends them to London to investigate spirits tormenting a single mother and her four children.
The Daily Wire had a chance to talk with devout Christians Chad and Carey and discuss why they are passionate about Ed and Lorraine Warren&#8217;s paranormal investigations, their fascination with the horror genre, and how their faith influences the way they make a movie like The Conjuring 2.
What originally attracted you to Ed and Lorraine Warren and their stories?
Carey: The great thing was they were investigating the paranormal when it wasn&#8217;t normal.
Chad: Right.
Carey: You know what I&#8217;m saying, it&#8217;s like in today&#8217;s day and age you have so much stuff going on with TV shows, reality shows&#8211;
Chad: You have plumbers investigating scares and ghosts.
Carey: And they didn&#8217;t have any gadgets! And we always say&#8211; Chad and I always say&#8211; the sharpest tool in their shed was their faith&#8230; And what we liked in presenting something from Ed and Lorraine&#8217;s point of view, is it&#8217;s like calling a cop. Calling 911. Because they&#8217;re stepping into a situation that for the family is already pumped up.
Chad: Escalated, yeah.
Carey: Escalated. So [the families] are like watching the experts. How are the experts gonna handle this?
Chad: I just think we were really attracted to them because of how they approached everything, you know, they were people&#8217;s last resort. And when they took it in [like] Carey said, their sharpest tool was faith and that&#8217;s all they could use so we thought it&#8217;d be fun to go back to the days when there just weren&#8217;t gadgets and cell phones and things like that. It was just rudimentary and real. [It] just felt so real.
Carey: And I also think what attracted us&#8230;we&#8217;re very very fond of Lorraine.
Chad: She&#8217;s awesome.
Carey: I&#8217;m sorry Ed passed away before we could meet him. But as characters, how strong their marriage was&#8211;
Chad: Uh-huh.
Carey: And how much they really relied on each other, was really a strong foundation to tell a story from a different point of view.
Chad: Yeah, she still talks about Ed all of the time. It&#8217;s beautiful. What they had was amazing. They&#8217;d known each other since they were like 15 years old.
Carey: Yeah.
Chad: 15 and 16&#8230;it&#8217;s cool.
With The Conjuring 2, what new emotional places were you looking to push Ed and Lorraine as characters?
Chad: Well that&#8217;s interesting too because we chose to go, in the second one, at a time when their lives were kind of in turmoil following the whole Amityville experience which was true. They were called charlatans and fakes and phonies. And Lorraine will tell you&#8230;she and Ed&#8211; Ed more than she&#8211; &#8230; didn&#8217;t really care what people had to say because she always said it&#8217;s between them and God. And God knows the truth. So&#8230;in the second one what we were able to do is really escalate, you know, how one feels when what you do and you know is truthful [but] people begin to think it&#8217;s not and you&#8217;re accused of being phonies and fakes. And so it&#8217;s interesting because, in the Enfield case, that family was accused of the exact same thing so we felt on an emotional level the Warrens could definitely identify with that family. It&#8217;s something that they were going through personally. So we were able to escalate that on both sides to discover the truth so we thought that was kinda fun.
Carey: And I also think on a character level&#8230; [Ed and Lorraine&#8217;s] connection and understanding on a multitude of levels was really important to bring out and enhance in this chapter.
Chad: [I] hand it to Patrick and Vera too who are just so talented&#8211; to bring that enduring element to the relationship. If you compare this film to the last film, not only is it scarier but on an emotional level the mark has been raised. You see them going through different experiences as a married couple. You know, the doubt [and] you get the answers to the first movie as to what has haunted Lorraine&#8230;that finally comes out. You know, we really felt like there was a big cross hatching of emotional rides to go on [and] physical experiences&#8230; James just kicked it with the scares and the timing&#8230; all that kind of stuff so it was fun! It was exciting! Now you think about what you do for the next one.
Have you both been intentionally working on all horror projects for the past few years? Is that where you want to be situated or is that just how it&#8217;s fallen into place?
Carey: It has been a lot of our focus. Chad and I really love writing movies where good triumphs over evil&#8230; but no, we&#8217;re not locked in that. We just turned in a movie for New Line [Cinema].
Chad: An action piece.
Carey: A smoke jumper action movie.
Chad: We&#8217;re not credited but we worked a lot on San Andreas&#8212; the earthquake movie.
Carey: A couple years on that.
Chad: We&#8217;re actually just about to start another film called The Haunted which is going to be directed by Juan Carlos Fresnadillo.
Carey: For Dreamworks.
Chad: For Dreamworks. We finished another film called The Crucifixion with Peter Safran, our producer on The Conjuring&#8230; It&#8217;s another religious story. It takes place in Romania. It&#8217;s based on a true story. So yeah, to answer your question we&#8217;re very drawn to [horror films] because its clear cut on good vs. evil and how you triumph over it &#8230; with strength and conviction.
Although we didn&#8217;t meet Ed [Warren], Lorraine told us the greatest story. Ed Warren liked to hire cops who were non believers to record a lot of their investigations because he loved to see the expression on their faces when they discovered the supernatural world was real. He just loved it.
Speaking of religious stories, you come from a unique perspective in the horror genre through your Christian faith. How does that faith influence the way you make horror films?
Chad: Truthful. We stick to the truth, you know. We use real scripture&#8230;we&#8217;re identifying through our two lead characters who are both very strong believers&#8211;
Carey: Their faith reflects our faith, honestly.
Chad: Yeah, it really does. We kinda build up these movies [with] Ephesians&#8230; There&#8217;s some really great scripture in there that sorta is the foundation for a lot of these kinda films. You can go to Ephesians 12&#8211; for our struggle is not against flesh and blood but against&#8230; the rulers&#8230; the authorities&#8230; the powers of the dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. That kinda sums the whole thing up&#8230; [Lorraine] says Ephesians 16&#8230; she says take up the shield of faith with which you can extinguish all of the flaming arrows of the evil one. And she&#8217;ll tell you that right to your face.
Often I hear Christians say &#8216;Why would a Christian be making horror films? Why would they want to deal with such darkness? Why would they want to scare people? Why would you want to put evil in front of them?&#8217; What do you say to these questions?
Carey: [So you] &#8230; know that you have that faith in yourself to combat that evil. Or that the resources are out there to help you&#8230; I could give one quick example. We did a premiere for some friends and family to watch The Conjuring and I had a buddy of mine come up afterwards and he said&#8230;&#8217;Man, I had the most amazing talk with my son on the ride home.&#8217; They don&#8217;t go to church but he had questions about God: &#8216;Dad, do you think that really exists? Good and Evil?&#8217; And he was drawn, you know.
Chad: That&#8217;s cool.
Carey: He was drawn to go to the church. So it&#8217;s like even if you change one person&#8217;s view&#8211;
Chad: Well also&#8230; we&#8217;re drawn to them because it raises questions and when you raise questions it causes people to search and when people search they make discoveries. And so we do it in that realm. I can&#8217;t tell you&#8230; on the first [Conjuring], how many pastors, ministers&#8230; Rick Warren congratulated Carey and I&#8230; on just finally getting it right. Telling the truth. Letting the world know&#8230; how it really exists. We were at a place and a priest came up to Carey and I&#8230; and he said &#8216;I can&#8217;t tell you how many people I&#8217;ve brought to your film&#8211; to see your movie&#8211; because you guys said it right.&#8217; And youth pastors&#8230; this guy [told us] &#8216;Oh yeah, we do Friday night Conjuring now for our youth groups&#8230; we screen the movie and then we have open forums.&#8217; It just raises a lot of questions and with questions come answers.
Carey: Well and if you think about horror movies&#8230; it&#8217;s like a roller coaster ride. You&#8217;re gonna watch this movie, you&#8217;re gonna be safe but you&#8217;re going to go through ups and downs. But if it&#8217;s also a journey into the dark world and watching good prevail, that&#8217;s a very interesting way and very entertaining way to look at something like that. I mean House of Wax is like the only gore-porn type thing we&#8217;ve done.
Chad: Right. Most of ours are spiritually themed. Like The Reaping which was our Hilary Swank film, was loosely based on our aunt who was a missionary in India. We&#8217;re also drawn to [horror] because we felt like&#8211; and I don&#8217;t mean this in a mean way&#8211; the Christian audiences have never really been delivered quality movies. Really good quality films. They tend to be kind of a little hokey.
Carey: A little over the top.
Chad: A little over the top. A little preachy. And we try not to preach at all, you know. The truth will set you free. You discover it. It&#8217;s a rewarding thing to have people actually give you those accolades [like] &#8216;wow, I can&#8217;t believe you did a Christian themed film in the way that you did it. And did it well.&#8217;
Carey: But we did not intentionally start out [saying] &#8216;we&#8217;re going to do this as a Christian themed movie.&#8217;
Chad: No. It was the story.
Carey: It was the story and it was Ed and Lorraine&#8217;s faith that surfaced because of it.
Chad: Yeah, and it crossed over. The first one crossed over secular and non-secular worlds which wasn&#8217;t a big surprise because the test audience [screenings] had done so well but as Carey said we did not intentionally set out to write a Christian themed movie. We set out to write a story that we found so compelling.
What do you want audiences to take away when they leave The Conjuring 2?
Carey: A stronger sense of faith I think.
Chad: That you have the strength and power within yourself to take authority over anything demonic that you might encounter. You just have to believe that you can.
You can&#8217;t have a Bible sitting on your shelf and not read it because then it&#8217;s just a book, you know. If you have a Bible and you read it and you take on the authority and you believe in it, you have the power.
Carey: Yeah, and also know that there is a dark world out there&#8211; watch yourself.
Chad: Yeah, be careful.
Carey: Be careful what you do! The darkness can come&#8211;
Chad: When you wake up in the middle of the night and you feel like something is pushing on your chest I would get a little nervous, you know!
The Conjuring 2 is a well crafted sequel with terrifying scenes, stunning visuals, and poignant performances. You&#8217;ll spend half of the movie peeking through the cracks in your hands while your heart races and the other half moved by Ed and Lorraine&#8217;s love for each other and their courage in the face of pure evil.
The Conjuring 2, directed by James Wan and starring Vera Farmiga, Patrick Wilson, Madison Wolfe, and Francis O&#8217;Connor, hits theaters June 10.

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