An on-again, off-again film about the military contributions of Bedford-area soldiers is back in production.

Backed by an $800,000 grant from the Virginia Film Office, a film crew from the Johnson Group, a documentary film company based in McLean, was in Bedford County last week to shoot landscapes and interview local veterans.

Producers of the film even took the unusual step of hosting a viewing of one of their previous films at the Bedford Area Welcome Center to show area officials and residents an example of their work.

"We're going to be here for a while," Robert Johnson, the company's president, told an audience of about 50 local government officials and residents.

"Bedford: The Town They left Behind" is the working title of the company's documentary film, designed to show the effects that war has on an average American community.

"Bedford, we think, is a really appealing, interesting and an important reference point on the subject of service to country, on the subject of what the cost of war is, and particularly ... as experienced by those that were left behind," said Joe Fab, the movie's producer.

The movie will focus on soldiers and their families from World War II to present-day service in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The National D-Day Memorial's presence in Bedford has brought to national attention the heroism shown by Bedford and other Southwest Virginia soldiers during World War II. The memorial commemorates the valor of American and Allied soldiers during the June 6, 1944, invasion of Nazi-occupied France, known as D-Day. The 19 Bedford-area men who died during the opening hours of the invasion are thought to be among the highest casualties suffered by any American community.

Previous documentary films, as well as author Alex Kershaw's 2003 book, "The Bedford Boys," have also focused on Bedford's D-Day sacrifices.

"Obviously the World War II story, because of what it is, is important and interesting to everybody," Fab said. "It's a big focal point, but it's not all that we expect to tell."

A Johnson Group film crew was in Bedford in July to film and interview the homecoming of Virginia Army National Guardsmen who were deployed for a year in Afghanistan.

Like other films made by Fab, he said he likes to let the people being interviewed help determine the direction of the movie.

"We feel sure that the sort of universal themes that go with service to your country, and war, that that in itself is going to make a good film, but we're open to what else is going to turn up," he said. "We're completely open to where things will take us."

It was Kershaw's book that first got the Johnson Group interested in Bedford's war contributions. Company producers worked with Kershaw for about a year after his book was published on a movie that Kershaw said would focus in large part on his "Bedford Boys" research.

When funding for the project was slow in coming, the movie was put on hold. Kershaw said he grew tired of not being paid anything for his efforts and cut his ties with Johnson.

Last year, funding for the film became available when the Virginia General Assembly appropriated $800,000 to the Virginia Film Office to be used on movies focusing on Virginia history.

"They were the only applicant," said Rita McClenny, the film office's vice president of industry relations, regarding the Johnson Group's request.

Threatened with a lawsuit last year by Kershaw over using his research without being compensated, the Johnson Group broadened the scope of the movie to include Vietnam veterans and veterans of the Persian Gulf, Afghanistan and Iraq.

Kershaw indicated Monday that the movie's expanded outline makes going forward with a lawsuit unlikely.

"That's different than just ripping my book off, which is what they were going to do before," he said.

It's unclear when this latest Bedford movie will be available. Fab said it's conceivable that filming could still be going on this time next year. Editing could take several more months after that, but Johnson said Bedford residents will be the first to see the completed project.