Fireproof is the latest feature from Sherwood Pictures of Sherwood Baptist Church in Albany, Ga., which launched Facing the Giants two years ago. Kirk Cameron, best known as Mike Seaver in the sitcom Growing Pains, plays the lead.
The movie, which opens Friday, Sept. 26, was produced and co-written by Stephen Kendrick.
Last month, Cameron, along with director and co-writer Alex Kendrick, and actor Tommy McBride, were scheduled to visit Focus on the Family. Kendrick and McBride joined the Boundless podcast team in the studio, but Cameron was forced to join by phone after his plane made an emergency landing.
CitizenLink is pleased to offer pieces of the interviews with Boundless:
1. Boundless: Where did the idea for Fireproof come from, and what are you hoping to accomplish?
Alex: Our prayer, from the beginning, was, "God, give us a plot that impact all of culture." We wanted this movie to change culture.
I was running around the block one day, and it was almost like the Lord gave me an epiphany, and he said, "Tell the story of a marriage where the husband is trying to win back the heart of his wife, and he learns what it really means to love someone."
I, as well as so many others, are tired of marriage being watered-down and attacked and redefined. We wanted to lift up a standard with this movie: What does marriage look like? And what was it intended to be?"
2. Kirk, how did you get involved with this project?
Kirk: My first interest in working with the Kendricks came after I saw Facing the Giants.
I told Alex, "If you're ever making another movie, please consider letting me come be a part of it." A year and a half later, we had struck up a friendship, and they were getting ready to make Fireproof. I had read the script after they asked me if I'd be interested in auditioning, and I said, "Yeah, I'd love to!"
3. How does this movie fit into the mission God has given you, Kirk?
Kirk: When I became a Christian (at 17), the thought of being able to tell great stories, life-changing, impacting stories that would include the Gospel, or some kind of truth, through the media, was very exciting. So I've always looked for opportunities to do that.
When Fireproof came around, I thought, "Wow, this would be a great opportunity to be part of a project where the Lord is getting a message out to people about marriage — a sacred institution, an institution that is falling apart. It's been watered down. It's been redefined. It's been maligned and attacked. This is a great time to try to turn the statistics around by holding up God's picture of marriage, and say, "This is something so much bigger, so much better, and so much more awesome, than what most people have ever been told, and have ever experienced."
I think Fireproof is really going to point people in a new direction and give them practical steps on how to change the future of their marriage.
4. Kirk, how do you think Fireproof will be received in Hollywood?
Kirk: In Hollywood, marriages rarely survive. I think my wife, Chelsea, and I have set a record being married 17 years and both of us being actors. (They have six kids, as well!)
Nobody walks down that aisle preparing to get divorced. People want marriage to work. The ideal is there, but most people just don't know what to do when the going gets tough — particularly if they don't understand the selfish nature of man.
As the years go on, real character issues start to rise to the surface. That's when we need help. That's when we need an overhaul of our definition of love. That's when we need God to step in, transform individual hearts, and then learn what it means to love. People are up for a happy, healthy, successful marriage for life; they just don't know how to do it.
No matter who you are or where you live, you're going to see this movie and say, "You know what? I have blown it. And I would love to have happen to me what happened to the people in this movie." It is possible. It starts by getting on your knees and getting right with God yourself before you can begin to transform someone else and a marriage with that kind of love.
5. Tommy, we hear you're newly engaged. Why should single people care about this movie?
Tommy: Imagine putting a couple that's about to be married in the cockpit of a 747, and saying, "Guys, we hope it goes really well. Have fun!" And they're thinking, "How are we supposed to fly this 747 without proper training?" — premarital counseling. Essentially, that's what we're doing in our culture. It's easier to get a marriage license in America than it is a driver's license. But marriage is intended to be for life. It is complex, it is difficult, but it is wonderful.
In Fireproof, we start in the middle of a marriage that is already in trouble — as so many marriages are. Well, what now? If your marriage is in trouble, and you're about to bail out, is there any hope? Well, there is. We start in the middle of Caleb and Catherine's life. They've been married several years; they're about to get divorced.
On their way to go through the divorce process, Caleb's father challenges his son to hold off the divorce for 40 days while he considers a "love dare."
Our purpose of this movie is to say, "We all need counsel. We all need mentors. We all need hope. We all need to know we're not going through these problems exclusively."
Hopefully, audiences will laugh, they'll cry, they'll be tense at times, and they'll identify what is going on, on the screen.
FOR MORE INFORMATION
Visit the movie Web site.
Kirk Cameron is a producer and host of The Way of the Master television series and radio program.
Check out the Boundless webzine and podcast.
(NOTE: Referral to Web sites not produced by Focus on the Family is for informational purposes only and does not necessarily constitute an endorsement of the sites' content.)
