Struggling to meet sales targets for The Gospel of John and dealing with the resignation of all but one director, Toronto-based Visual Bible International’s grand plans to produce word-for-word retellings of all 66 books of the Bible by 2015 may have hit something significantly stronger than the walls of Jericho.

According to reports in the Globe and Mail, DVD sales of the three-hour epic, which debuted theatrically in the fall, have fallen well short of the 600,000 target set by the company, reaching 40,000 in 2003.

Company filings in April stated that ‘if sales do not meet or exceed budgeted expectations and if [Visual Bible] is, otherwise, unable to obtain additional capital, the company will certainly be in default [on its debt] and may be forced to cease its operations.’

The same filing, however, also indicates that DVD/video sales of the $17-million feature have generated in excess of $5-million worth of shipments to retail and rental outlets since March. The film, coproduced by Garth Drabinsky, has made over US$4 million at the North American box office and continues to be rolled out in small communities across Canada and the U.S.

‘If we continue at this sales pace, we’ll be well beyond our expectations. So that’s on the positive side,’ says Visual Bible CEO Maurice Colson. ‘We just got off to a slow start. We felt our way around and we spent money in areas we probably shouldn’t have and it held us up.’

Specifically, Colson attributes the slower-than-anticipated sales to miscalculations on the company’s approach to its direct-mail and direct-response TV and radio advertising campaign, which allowed consumers to order videos and DVDs by phone.

‘This is a new idea, marketing [a feature DVD] like this. More importantly, when we came out before Christmas we weren’t allocated very good [air] times because they had been presold. So we were fit in here and there. We wasted a lot of money. We should have just held back and waited until the new year,’ Colson says.

The release of Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ, while generating awareness in the Christian market, also stole some of The Gospel of John’s thunder, Colson says. ‘But all in all it helps us in the space,’ he adds.

According to Colson, the John Goldsmith script is completed for The Gospel of Mark, and the company hopes to get production underway by August. But the producer is still trying to complete financing.

In February, businessman Steven Small resigned as chairman and later a group headed by controlling shareholder Elly Reisman also stepped down, leaving Colson the sole board member. A new board has yet to be appointed.