{"id":104011,"date":"2025-08-23T10:20:11","date_gmt":"2025-08-23T10:20:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/104011\/"},"modified":"2025-08-23T10:20:11","modified_gmt":"2025-08-23T10:20:11","slug":"animated-film-light-of-the-world-brings-life-of-jesus-to-big-screen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/104011\/","title":{"rendered":"Animated Film \u2018Light of the World\u2019 Brings Life of Jesus to Big Screen"},"content":{"rendered":"

Feature-length animated film Light of the World, which depicts Jesus\u2019 life and ministry, will soon open in theaters<\/a>\u2014after a years-long production led in part by former Disney artists.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a reimagining of telling the life story of Jesus through the eyes of a young disciple, John,\u201d said John Schafer, co-director of Light of the World, in a recent radio interview. \u201cIt\u2019s a fresh take on it. We made this movie for everyone, but we wrote it for people who may not have a concept of Jesus or the Bible.\u201d<\/p>\n

The film, set to hit theaters across the U.S. and Canada on Sept. 5, is brought to life in a 2D animation style\u2014which is no accident. Tom Bancroft, co-director on Light of the World, and his twin brother Tony, animation director, spent a decade at Walt Disney Animation Studios prior to going independent.<\/p>\n

The Bancrofts worked on 90\u2019s Disney hits including Beauty and the Beast, The Lion King, Mulan, and The Emperor\u2019s New Groove. Now they\u2019re hoping this new feature stands up to those renowned animated classics.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re Disney legends\u2014creating Mushu, creating Pumbaa and Kronk,\u201d said Schafer. \u201cWe thought, If we\u2019re going to retell this story, let\u2019s tell it in a medium that we all love.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\"lightJesus Christ and the disciple John, as depicted in the film, \u2018Light of the World\u2019 (Image: Salvation Poem Project)<\/p>\n

In a recent interview at Lorehaven<\/a>, the Bancroft brothers, who both profess Christian faith, said producing a movie about Jesus was as challenging as any previous animation work.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can imagine the pressure of thousands of years of faithful people who know the Bible so well and theologians who spoke into this,\u201d said Tony Bancroft. \u201cTo make it entertaining and capsulize the Gospel truths within that, that was so much.\u201d<\/p>\n

The traditional-animated approach differs from this year\u2019s earlier animated Gospel adaptation feature<\/a>, The King of Kings, produced by a South Korean team in a 3D animation style. Released by Angel Studios during Easter, that film has earned<\/a> $76 million worldwide.<\/p>\n

Light of the World retells the life of Christ through the young disciple John\u2019s eyes. According to Schafer, John would have been in his teen years during the time he followed Jesus.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\u201cWe really felt strongly that it had to be a disciple, because that would draw credibility to the story. We thought if we went with the youngest, John, as he\u2019s learning about this Messiah and becoming friends with this Messiah, the audience is discovering it at the same time.\u201d<\/p>\n

The film has been produced by Salvation Poem Project<\/a>, founded by Christian entrepreneur Matt McPherson. His son, Brennan McPherson, serves as president of the organization and both are producers on the film, which reportedly<\/a> has a $20 million budget.<\/p>\n

Light of the World is primarily based on narratives from the Gospel of John, with additional stories drawn from other Gospels. It took the team almost four years from start to finish.<\/p>\n

\u201cI hope that people who go see this movie because they\u2019re familiar with the story, that they take a friend or family member that they might not feel comfortable sharing the Gospel with,\u201d said Schafer. \u201cWe really hope that people discover that Jesus is their friend.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Josh Shepherd contributed to this article, which was originally published at\u00a0CHVN Radio<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Sylvia St. Cyr is an on-air radio host at CHVN, a Christian outlet in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Feature-length animated film Light of the World, which depicts Jesus\u2019 life and ministry, will soon open in theaters\u2014after…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":104012,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[52],"tags":[88,206],"class_list":["post-104011","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-entertainment","tag-movies"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104011","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=104011"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104011\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/104012"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=104011"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=104011"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=104011"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}