Walden Media (The Chronicles of Narnia) will be the first recipient of the 2008 International Family Film Festival Film Excellence Award for their steadfast commitment to quality Family Films and the production of classic children’s literature on Sunday March 2nd, 6:30PM at Hollywood’s own, Raleigh Studios. This is the first time that the 13 year old film festival has chosen to honor a production company for their contributions to the family film library. This precedent-setting honor was voted on unanimously by the entire Board of Directors of the International Family Film Festival because of the consistent commitment to quality production demonstrated by Walden Media and a vision of integrating education with film that has been characteristic of their distribution model.

Walden Media is a frontrunner in the family film genre. The mission of tthe company rings clear; film can promote a love of books and books can promote a love of film! Together, these mediums can create ‘imagination re-generation’ in today’s youth.

As stated by the company, ”We started Walden Media with a simple goal: bring the kind of books we all love and admire to the screen. And that's what we've done with films based on classic books like The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe or recent award-winning novels such as Holes and Because of Winn-Dixie. We also publish books, like the Paddywhack Lane series and The White Giraffe. Some of our productions and publications are inspired by real-life stories like the incredible career of Jim Thorpe, or the wonders of deep-sea exploration.”

The Company asks this question, “What inspires you? Most likely the same things that inspire and excite those of us at Walden Media. Great stories from great literature. A passionate and compassionate author. Characters we can fall in love with. A tale that enlightens us.”

They go on to explain, “But we are also inspired by you. You and all the teachers, parents, librarians, community leaders, and most of all, the kids who read and love great books. We do our best to listen to you. You let us know what's ‘hot’. But more importantly, you have a deep understanding of which books and stories are enduring, the ones that celebrate lasting values. The stories that we all love.”

Fantastic movies created with an underlying mission to promote literacy, education and imagination seem to be the underlying goals of the company. What an ingenious way to cultivate a love of books in a cluture where no one, not even big kids, seem to want to read much anymore. We’ve become a nation of watchers rather than readers, but Walden Media is changing all that one classroom at a time.