End-times thriller will have 'bigger budget' for the big-screen production, due to start next year

Plans are being made for a new, improved movie version of the best-selling end-times thriller Left Behind (Tyndale House Publishers).

The project is being developed by Cloud Ten Pictures, which released the first film adaptation of the book in 2000, following it with two other installments from the successful series of novels by Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins—which have sold more than 64 million copies since the first title came out in 1995.

The second screen version of Left Behind: The Movie follows the resolution of a long-running dispute between Cloud Ten and LaHaye, who was unhappy with the filmmaker's releases. The film rights reverted to LaHaye and Jenkins in 2008 as part of a settlement, but were returned to Cloud Ten as of Oct. 1, the company announced.

The remake will be “at the true Hollywood 'blockbuster' level that a message like this deserves,” said Cloud Ten founder and CEO Paul Lalonde. Company President André van Heerden said that while the previous films had touched millions, “we know that the story can have an even bigger impact as a bigger-budget, end-times thriller on the big screen.”

Production is due to start late next year.

Meanwhile, Tyndale has published the “Left Behind” series in four repackaged editions. Volume 1: Rapture's Witness, released in January, features the series' first three books—Left Behind, Tribulation Force and Nicolae. Volume 2: Deceiver's Game, released in April, included Soul Harvest, Apollyonand Assassins. The final two collections—Evil's Edge and World's End—completed the repackaged editions and were released in June and September, respectively. 

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