Filmmaker turns Westfield into the Bible's ancient lands

(Photo courtesy of Forgiven Films) When young filmmaker Josh Martyn, a rural Westfield native, asked family and friends to help with a Christian film telling the story of the Bible, they agreed. Martyn came to the Westfield area with a crew and shot several scenes like this, with King David as a boy shepherd. [Click to enlarge]

It's not time travel, it's the makings of a movie.

Rural Westfield native Josh Martyn was back in his neighborhood 5 miles south of Westfield to film scenes for "The Greatest Gift Ever," a 20-minute Christian film to be released before Christmas.

(Photo courtesy of Forgiven Films) In a scene showing the world as it was before the great flood and Noah's Ark in Genesis 6, Linda Banks, of Hawarden, portrays a pillager. The backdrop is rural Westfield, and rural Westfield native Josh Martyn is behind the camera. [Click to enlarge]

"The movie is about a grandfather, telling the Christmas story from Luke chapter 2 in the Bible," Martyn said in a phone interview. "One of his grandchildren asks him, 'Why did Jesus come?'"

The film, Martyn said, is basically the entire Bible in short clips as the grandfather answers his grandchild.

He tells stories from the Old Testament like God giving the 10 commandments and all the way to New Testament stories of Jesus.

Martyn is working on this movie for Forgiven Films, based in Fort Dodge.

"We got the concept and really hit it hard," Martyn said. "We started in March and had a lot of late nights."

In picking the settings for some of the clips, Martyn knew his family's acreage near Westfield and the surrounding land would be a good backdrop.

"On some of the local farmland, a grove of trees, some cattle land, we filmed the clip with Noah and his sons -- we actually (cut down) a tree, and we did the 10 commandments," Martyn said. "And we did a sheep shot with David."

He and his crew also filmed the scene where Jesus is with his disciples in the Garden of Gethsemane, praying to God before people come to take him and kill him.

"It was one of our biggest shots in terms of extras," Martyn said. "We had help from my parents, local farmers and the people I grew up around. Everyone has been very helpful."

Martyn is filming other scenes in the Badlands of South Dakota, Missouri and Fort Dodge.

Once the film is complete, a full Spanish translation will also be made.

"It will be marketed as far across the U.S. as possible, mostly to churches in the U.S.," he said.

Martyn and his crew finished filming the last shot in the area Saturday.

"It turned out well," he said. "The land worked for what I needed."

Martyn, who graduated from a Sioux City high school in 1998, started filming in seventh grade.

"Back then it was just to be funny," he said. "Then I went to Bible college and that all changed. My heart changed. My whole thrust changed. I wanted to make Christian videos."

That, he said, doesn't mean he's done making people laugh.

Martyn and his friend, Matt Stallman, now work together. Stallman goes on mission trips into the jungles of Peru. Martyn films mission videos.

"We do a lot of mission work in and out of the country," Martyn said.

The concept of the film "The Greatest Gift Ever" was a natural fit for Martyn.

"It's the full Gospel," he said. "It's to lift up Jesus."