Canadian companies big into Bible video project

Business is betting on longterm demand for a visual Bible

MAXWELL RYAN
Special to CW
— Toronto —

Coming soon to home video—the Bible in living colour and sound. Abraham, Moses, Esther, Jesus, Peter, Paul and thousands of other biblical persons will move, speak, laugh, cry, pray.

Visual Bible International Inc. is aiming to present the Scriptures so that when you think of the Bible, you’ll see pictures and hear sounds, as well as remember reading the words.

The company has already produced the Gospel of Matthew video, a dramatized word-for-word copy of the gospel text (New International Version), using advanced production techniques and talented American actors. It runs four-and-a-half hours.

There is also a video version of Acts. As with Matthew (which has a DVD version), filming took place in Tunisia, Morocco and South Africa. Filming on Luke and John is currently in progress. The book of Genesis—which will be 11 hours long—is slated to start in January.

Eventually the entire 66 books of the Bible will be filmed, with emphasis on historical accuracy and faithfulness to the biblical text. The company has exclusive rights to use the NIV, ASB,GNB and CEV in the filming, and is hoping for the NKJV as well.

Not only will the Bible be available on video, there are plans for future viewers to search for themes and download pay-per-view segments of their choice from the Internet. The videos include made-for-children series, with titles such as “The Birth of Jesus,” “The Great Storyteller” and “The story behind the cross.”

Duller parts?

And how will the “duller” parts of the Bible—such as the genealogies and the legalities of Levicitus—be handled? A spokesman says this has not yet been decided. “We’ll start with the easy books, and figure that out later,” says Lennox Tibbs.

There’s Canadian money behind this multi-media Bible project, which will cost $400 million and take about 15 years to complete. This summer Trinity Capital Corporation, a Toronto merchant bank, acquired Visual Bible Inc. through a company called American Uranium in a takeover of a South African company that produced and successfully marketed a visual version of the Gospel of Matthew.

Visual Bible International has recently, through Visual Bible Inc., signed a letter of intent with Stewart House Publishing, formerly a division of McClelland and Stewart. Stewart Publishing will have the exclusive right to distribute some of the productions. Although the Visual Bible is incorporated in Florida, financial and operational offices are in Toronto, with film production offices in Nashville, Tenn.

Financing

The project will be financed both publicly and privately. Since the Trinity takeover, share prices of Visual Bible Inc. have climbed from 25 cents in March to more than $12 US.

What started out as a business venture soon turned into a matter of the heart. Toronto financier James Beatty, an Anglican and president of Visual Bible Inc., initially thought the concept was too evangelistic, too fundamentalist. But he changed his mind when his own young children were transfixed by it.

Further information may be accessed through www.visualbible.com.