Sony's faith-based drama "Miracles from Heaven' has finally settled on a director to meet its spring 2016 release date target. Patricia Riggen, who directed the upcoming mining movie "The 33', has reportedly finalized a deal with the studio to helm the faith-based project.
The movie will be released under the TriStar Pictures label, the same label that distributed the Christian drama film "Heaven Is for Real'. With the latter grossing $91 million in the domestic box office using a budget of $12 million, Sony is aiming for "Miracles from Heaven' to be in production this year.
The new movie will be reuniting the same producers who worked on "Heaven Is for Real'; these include T.D. Jakes, Joe Roth and DeVon Franklin, the former Sony executive and Seventh-Day Adventist minister who now works as a producer for the Culver City lot.
Randy Brown, who worked on Clint Eastwood's "Trouble With the Curve', had written the script.
The upcoming project will be an adaptation of the book titled "Three Miracles From Heaven: A Sick Little Girl, Her Journey to Heaven, and the Lives Forever Changed' written by Christy Beam that is to be released on April 14.
The book tells the ultimate story of faith and blessings as Beam's memoir follows the experiences of her daughter who miraculously survived a life-threatening digestive disorder.
After being rescued from a dangerous accident, her daughter's visit to Heaven along with the mysterious disappearance of the symptoms of her incurable disease become a series of miracles that leave their family, doctors and community members in awe.
Raised in Mexico, Riggen previously directed the Mexican-American drama film "Under the Same Moon' ("La Misma Luna') and the Disney Channel movie "Lemonade Mouth.'
Her upcoming movie "The 33', which is based on Hector Tobar's "Deep Down Dark' book, tells the story of 33 Chilean miners who had been trapped underground for 69 days.
In 2014, Franklin opened up about his Franklin Entertainment production company and in collaborating with Sony to bring positive change in the lives of others one movie at a time.
"It's about finding great content with mass appeal that still has an uplifting quality about it," Franklin said in an interview with Millennial Magazine. "I want people's hearts to be touched, their lives to be touched, and I want the evidence of that to show up at the box office."
