Even before its release, the film was scorned by part of the French cultural elite, provoking either mockery or indignation towards content deemed to be overly proselytizing. Even France’s state-owned railway companies refused to advertise the film.  As the box-office numbers show, these efforts did little to dissuade the public. On the contrary: Sacré-Cœur: son règne n’a pas de fin (“Sacred Heart: His Reign Is Endless”), directed and produced by Steven Gunnell and his wife Sabrina Gunnell, has become the cinematic surprise of the year.

Since its Oct. 1 release, the film has defied every prediction: nearly half a million tickets sold, record attendance per screening, and a wave of conversions to the faith. 

There are plans to extend the film to a global audience, with a U.S. release currently slated for just before or during celebrations for the 2026 Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, according to SAJE Distribution. 

In anticlerical France, where the simple display of Christmas Nativity scenes is often prohibited in public places, no one expected the story of the Sacred Heart of Jesus to draw crowds larger than some Hollywood productions. 

A former member of the popular 1990s boy band Alliage, Gunnell rebuilt his life after years of addiction and depression following the dissolution of his group and rediscovering his faith in the 2000s — a journey that slowly led him to filmmaking.

This success is not a matter of marketing or controversy for Gunnell, but the revelation of something deeper: “The world is dying from not knowing how much it is loved,” he told the Register. “This film is simply an answer.”

A Key to the Mystery of Christ

The 92-min docudrama recounts Christ’s apparitions to St. Marguerite-Marie (Margaret Mary) Alacoque in Paray-le-Monial in the 17th century, one of the most decisive chapters of Christian history. Through testimonies, accounts of Eucharistic miracles, historical analysis and reenactments, the film explores the moment when Christ revealed his Heart to the world, its burning love for humanity and its suffering for their sins. 

The project emerged from converging personal stories. The message of Paray-le-Monial played a significant role in Sabrina Gunnell’s path of faith, awakening in her young artist’s heart the longing to walk beside a Christian husband, so that together they might help radiate something of God’s greatness through art. Steven’s mother, too, had once experienced an unexpected and deeply personal encounter with the Sacred Heart — long before her own conversion years later.

“It was through these two stories, and later through our rediscovery of the sanctuary as a couple, that Sabrina and I began to understand the spirituality of the Sacred Heart,” he explained.

Over time, both realized that the message entrusted to St. Marguerite-Marie remains the answer to a world suffering from despair, division and a devastating loss of transcendence.

For Gunnell, the message of the Sacred Heart is pivotal to understanding the entire mystery of Christ — especially the Eucharist. 

“When the priest says, ‘the Body of Christ,’ I hear ‘the Heart of Christ,’” he said, “because the Eucharistic miracles showed even scientifically that the flesh found on the Host is myocardial tissue. We are literally receiving his Heart.”

“For those who receive this devotion,” he added, “it is nuclear. It is a renewal of sacraments. It reorders everything.”

 The World’s Immense Thirst for God

Part of the film’s impact, according to the director, stems from the broader cultural moment into which it has emerged. Across the Western world, societies appear increasingly vulnerable, with rising youth despair, widespread loneliness and a sense of meaninglessness. He cited the recent assassination of U.S. Christian commentator Charlie Kirk, revealing the depth of the world’s polarization. 

“Look at this violence …” he said. “Look at this youth that kills for nothing, that collapses under despair. When I was young, fights ended with a punch. Today, it ends with a knife.”

This climate of restlessness also helps explain the renewed search for God  — including in France, where the extraordinary rise in adult baptisms has prompted the bishops to convene a national council in 2026. 

“It is about answering a thirst,” Gunnell insisted, “an immense thirst for God.”

‘Jesus Loves France’... Even When France Doesn’t

The opposition the film has faced seems to have amplified its success. After public advertising networks refused to display the film’s posters in the name of “neutrality,” the mayor of Marseille went a step further and banned a scheduled screening an hour before showtime, with the theater already full and the audience waiting outside.

Gunnell said this response is rooted in France’s post-Revolution identity crisis: “Certain elites cannot bear that this film touches the heart of France,” he explained. “For them, history began in 1789, and they were shocked to be reminded of a legacy that began a century before the Revolution — because, of course, Christ had seen it coming.”

For Gunnell, the apparitions of Paray-le-Monial are part of a divine pattern. “Jesus came into the world through the chosen people,” he said. “But it is not in Jerusalem that he later revealed his Heart — it was in France. Why? I think he loves France!”

This claim isn’t vain patriotism, but theological conviction, Gunnell stressed. The list of saints he cited during his conversation with the Register, indeed, is unmistakably French: St. Marguerite-Marie, St. Francis de Sales, St. Vincent de Paul, St. Louis-Marie Grignion de Montfort, St. Thérèse of Lisieux and St. John Vianney.

Recalling how Scripture calls Israel “a stiff-necked people,” he added with a smile that “France might well be the second people with a hard head and a stiff neck. Perhaps this is why Jesus insisted so much and appeared for 18 months [to St. Margaret Mary]!”

 ‘God’s Perfect Timing’

Since the film’s release, Paray-le-Monial has been overwhelmed with visitors. The sanctuary receives a constant flow of emails and calls from individuals — many far from the faith — who arrive wanting to consecrate themselves to the Sacred Heart, go to confession, or speak with a priest. Staff have even been trained to respond to this unexpected influx.

Amid this spiritual fruitfulness, tragedy and grace converged in Gunnell’s own life. His father — to whom he had been estranged for decades and who was far from the Church — received the Eucharist on Aug. 15, 2023, amid the film’s shooting. It was their final encounter. A year later, after his father’s death, Gunnell’s mother found a small English prayer card to the Sacred Heart among his belongings. Gunnell saw in it a delicate sign of God’s faithfulness.

Another unexpected convergence strengthened his sense of God’s perfect timing. Across the Atlantic, the U.S. bishops have unanimously decided to consecrate their country to the Sacred Heart of Jesus in June 2026, ahead of the 250th anniversary of the nation’s independence. For him, this confirms that the message of the Sacred Heart is resurfacing wherever societies grow anxious and fractured.

As this chapter continues with an English version of the movie already in progress, another is ready to begin. The Gunnells are currently preparing their next film, La Lumière du Monde (“The Light of the World”), which will explore the Luminous Mysteries of Christ. A new fundraising campaign has recently begun to bring this project to life.

Sacré-Cœur, a source of embarrassment for cultural elites, while a source of hope for the masses, stands out as a sign of the times. In a world described as post-Christian, it is a discreet but profound spiritual awakening to the love of Christ. 

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