New faith-based horror film captures the essence of good & evil

While most faith-based films are inspiring stories, a new film, Nefarious, releasing today, is pushing the envelope in a never been done-before moment in Christian-inspired modern movies: horror. Nefarious, inspired by the 2020 novel of the same name by Steve Deace, is a film by the producers of Unplanned and God’s Not Dead Chuck Konzelman and Cary Solomon. It is being compared to a cross between C.S. Lewis’s Screw Tape Letters and Stephen King’s Silence of the Lambs. According to the producers, it’s been warfare as they’ve never seen before, yet it is produced and directed from a distinctly Christian perspective and meant to share the gospel in a way that few have done before. 

“We’ve tried to do what he (Jesus) says to do,” said Konzelmann on the Shawn Bolz show. “We listen to his voice. It seems to us, if you look at our track record, that signs of the times, what’s happening in society at that moment is when the Lord calls us to make a movie. Like right now, demonic possession is everywhere, and here he calls us to make this movie…he calls us to do it.”

The producers wanted to expose darkness and evil and point people to the truth and to Christ. Konzelman and Solomon shared with Bolz that society is increasingly creeping into the occult, and witchcraft and drifting further from the truth. 

“When you do what the Lord calls you to do, he sends that light through the darkness, and people start looking and get drawn to it,” said Solomon.

But the journey to releasing the film has been anything but easy. Challenges include eight car crashes, yet no one died, and the roof being torn off their production studio, among other things. Yet the producers pressed on because they believed it was a message that needed to be shared and believed the resistance speaks to the importance of the film’s message – that the enemy is at work with an evil agenda to destroy civilization and good needs to prevail against evil in our nation and our own lives.

The R-rated movie releases in theaters tonight. The producers encouraged believers to see the movie, that the film is safe and would open people’s eyes to what the enemy is doing and how good and evil collide in our culture. 

“This is a spiritual war movie, good versus evil, shows what the bad guys are doing and is safe…We’ve never betrayed our faith and we’ve never betrayed our Christian faith. It’s a movie that you need to see.”