Lights...Camera...Family

Jill Pickett

The Sampley family home's attic serves as the studio for their company Take 7 Films, housing equipment, copies of their films and costumes.

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Jill Pickett

"Dad the Hero in the Wild Wild West" is the most recent production of Take 7 Films. "Vagabundo" was an earlier project of the company.

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Jill Pickett

The Sampley family, from left, Levi, Candle, Jesse, Netta, Cori, Reed, Jamey, Anna and Amity make up Take 7 Films.

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By BECCA OWSLEY bowsley@thenewsenterprise.com ELIZABETHTOWN — Similar to the Von Trapp family of singers in “The Sound of Music.” without the mountains, nuns and Nazis, the Sampley family is a unit of nine who work together to make movies. Jamey and Netta Sampley started performing dramas 20 years ago. One featured a hobo in Central America called Vagabundo.” In 2000, the public schools in Costa Rica asked them to perform the drama and over the last eight years it has been performed to 60,000 public school students in every country in Central America except Honduras. When the oldest girls graduated, they wanted to produce films and decided to do a movie on the character featured in “Vagabundo.” Two years ago, they shot the film and premiered it in Costa Rica. After that Take 7 Films was born. Dad, mom and all seven children work on projects produced by their company based in the attic of the family’s Elizabethtown home. Each family member has a specific role in the production of the films. n Candle, 26, is the screenwriter, on set director and edits footage in the studio. n Amity, 24, arranges and composes the music along with sound recording and editing. n Cori, 21, is the cinematographer and special effects person which in their latest film included covering anything modern that didn’t belong in the west. She also helps with editing. n Anna, 16, Levi, 15, Jesse, 13, and Reed, 8, are actors in the productions. Levi and Jessie are also grips or gaffers helping with lights and moving things. “It’s wonderful to be in a family who loves God and does everything together as a family, we are always together and are best friends,” Anna said. Coordinated with their film projects is Family Builders International Ministries, which they created to encourage families. Through it they want to produce films that feature families staying together and relationships that remained strong. They especially wanted to focus on dads. They feel that their project will help dads fulfill their “God given responsibilities” and encourage them in the process. The “Dad the Hero” idea grew out of this ministry.   “Dad the Hero and the Incredible Cave Rescue” was their first try in this series. It is a 30-minute film shot at a cave near Upton. Wanting to improve the quality of their films, some family members went to camps and schools in Colorado. “God has blessed us with some great editors and film composers, especially out in the Colorado area that we’ve been able to tutor under a little,” Amity said. A couple of weeks ago they were able learn more by helping on a shoot for a commercial for Focus on the Family. For the sequel in the “Dad the Hero” series they decided to do a western called “Dad the Hero and the Wild Wild West.” The new production is an hour in length and borrowed cowboys from Guntown Mountain in Cave City for the production. “It definitely stretched us as a production more than the other things we have done,” Jamey, the dad, said. This movie starts out in an office in modern times. After the main character researches the West for an ad campaign his imagination drifts him back to the time of the Wild West. In his imaginary West, the dad has confrontations with some outlaws and has to stand up to them for his family. The movie’s major theme is a dad who stands up for his family – in the imaginary scenes against danger and in the modern scenes against normal, every day situations. Scenes for the film were shot in Guntown Mountain, the Hardin County History Museum, Campbellsville, Louisville and all over Kentucky. One scene was shot in Tennessee to use a stuntman during a kayaking scene. With three to four weeks of initial filming the whole project took a year to complete. The family hopes this project does well enough to do more and keep improving the quality of their films – possibly teaming with others in the industry who are better than they are. They have also made some video shorts for a company called Sermon Spice.com. Thousands of videos are submitted to the Web site and churches can download them to use with sermon material. The girls produce the films and get royalty checks — usually around $100. Reed, the youngest, was in one called “Dear Momma” around Mother’s Day and they received a check for $1,400 for his video and 186 churches have downloaded it. Jamey sees growth in the Christian family film industry citing the success of “Facing the Giants” as an example. The Sampley family has received recognition in the industry. All their films have been selected to go to the Independent Christian Film Festival in San Antonio and “Dad the Hero and the Incredible Cave Rescue” placed in the festival. “We see that family films, good messages and Godly values showing dad as the hero, the mom being the hero and showing kids that stand up to do what’s right are what people are looking for, something positive that will leave them with some hope,” Jamey said.   For more information: To find out more about Take 7 Films and their productions go to www.take7films.com. “Dad the Hero and the Wild Wild West” will premier today at 7 p.m. at Grace Heartland Church.   Becca Owsley can be reached at (270) 505-1741.