Romero is an original screenplay inspired by the slain archbishop of El Salvador and conceived by Paulist priest Ellwood E. Kieser. Kieser worked previously in Christian television programming, and when he took on the task of raising funds to make Romero, it marked his first attempt at a feature-length Hollywood film. The pro-Christian bias clearly comes through in the movie, since the story centers around Romero's personal relationship with the church and God as it relates to the civil situation in El Salvador. The movie does manage to stick to mostly documented historical fact, including the scenes of the massacre at San Salvador, the assassination of father Rutilio Grande, and the murder of Archbishop Romero. Romero's murder scene is even filmed in the actual church in which he was killed, although the exact scenario is not portrayed in exact detail. Overall, the film chronicles the documented history of Romero's four years in the Archbishop position, a period of time that has received a great deal of attention by historians and reporters.