I go to a great many screenings and encounter a great many publicists at these events. Usually, I know who they are from past encounters. At a recent screening of Letters to God, however, I came across a couple unfamiliar faces—and being the introvert that I am, I just signed in, grabbed an information packet, went in to grab a seat, and prepared myself for the tale of young boy who puts letters to God in his mailbox while struggling through the after-effects of brain-tumor surgery.

Imagine my surprise when it turned out that one of those unfamiliar faces as the check-in table was the film's director himself—David Nixon, also the producer of Facing the Giants and Fireproof. After he introduced the screening of Letters to God with a few personal comments, I buttonholed him with my business card, and he was kind to enough to follow up with a phone call.

Here's some of what Mr. Nixon and I chatted about.

GW: I was really pleased about the film's focus on prayer—but not specifically because there's lots of prayer in it, which is itself unusual in a film that's going into relatively wide release, but because of the way that prayer is treated in the film. People are not praying for blessings per se, or for healing; instead, the prayers seem really focused on the proper relationship between human beings and God, recognizing that we need his help.

DN: Yes. And that's what brought me to the project originally—this idea that this little boy's letters were really prayers. What a wonderful way to get that across to an audience. It was just so simple for him to write a letter to his best friend, God, every day and tell Him about his day. Because so many people say to me, "I don't know how to pray," or "God is so big; what do you say to God?" And here's a little eight-year-old boy going through this horrible cancer and if it's so easy for him to communicate with his best friend, how easy is it for us? Everybody can pray, and if it's just in a simple little letter, then that's a wonderful way to pray, you know?

GW: And my own experience with that is similar to Tyler's in the film, where sometimes it literally takes being chopped off at the knees to understand how to talk to God.

DN: Unfortunately, that happens sometimes. But we have to be at a critical phase in our lives to really see that we need God. That's why we believe the movie is going to be so powerful. There are so many people who are going through cancer and these kinds of horrible situations in their lives; and that's where you need to turn to God. And He's there. And He's real. And that's why the little boy says at the end of the movie, "Thanks, God. I just want everybody to believe." That's really the message of the movie: that's He's there for you, no matter what you're going through.