It’s no secret that my life, my lineage, and my family have faced more challenges than most. From the societal pressures of being the illegitimate child of drug-addled teens to dealing with the fallout of the death of my dad, Danny, in an LGBTQIA hate crime at fifteen, or surviving violation of being physically, mentally, financially, and sexually assaulted from an early age. Or the shame that comes from conflicts empaths face at the hands of individuals unable, and unwilling to live beyond the confines of their own sociopathy and psychopathy.
Issues that throughout my life, have left me feeling less than ideal in today’s modern world. Never being taught that sometimes, children are made to live down to the ramifications of being unbelieved by the clergy and greater Christian communities. It is far more than hyperbole to say, I’ve known first-hand what it means to fall between society’s cracks.
To find meaning in these experiences, I’ve tried a myriad of ways to bring myself closer to the vision of the kingdom I was presented as a child. From missioning in Central Africa, aiding children reeling from sexual exploitation to the social and the economic ramifications of the diamond trades, to becoming a civil rights attorney. Later, a writer. Granting myself permission to share my story, in prose and purpose, my own kingdom story. Experiences shading my perceptions of humanity.
Understandably, my past experiences require me to carve out time to watch the new film, Sound of Freedom, and to share my thoughts thereof with you, my readers, on Jim Caviezel’s disquieting thriller that seeks the individual to understand their part in child sex trafficking.
Sound of Freedom is a conservative thriller based on the true story of Tim Ballard, a former Department of Homeland Security special agent who has devoted himself to fighting child sex trafficking, and founder of Operation Underground Railroad, backed by Glenn Beck, a non-profit group that views the ideals of self-proclaimed freedom and healing, to rescue trafficked and exploited children, domestically and abroad. Starring Jim Caviezel, who also starred in the title role of Mel Gibson’s “The Passion of the Christ,” working on the likes of other faith-based projects for the past two decades.
The movie’s Christian undercurrent remains consistent throughout the film. With Ballard’s calling, the crime of trafficking leads him to enter affected mission fields, “Because God’s children are not for sale.” Giving viewers a captivating glimpse into the horrors of criminality, and its effects on trafficked children. Despite the film’s adjacent alt-right referencing to 4Chan and QAnon, heavily references various domestic and international conspiracy theories. Including Washington, D.C., pizza parlors being fronts for supposed pedophile rings, extending into larger conspiracies delving within the supposed culture of liberalism, and covering up pedophile rings, both domestically, and abroad.
Let me state that, as my opinion sits, currently and for the foreseeable future, these message boards are utter nonsense. However, assuming that you, like me, aren’t a right-wing fundamentalist conspiracy theorist looking for dark, faith-based suspense films, whose views range beyond extremist-based feel-good films, Sound of Freedom is worth watching. Shining authenticity and light upon crucial civil and human rights violations, domestic and abroad. Themses Hollywood has shied away from in recent decades. Shining a less than congenial light onto the egregious issues involving human trafficking. For this reason, Sound of Freedom, completed in 2018, deserves its fair dues.
This also leads to other important questions, including viewer demographics and parallels to the specific numbers of movies and television shows we’ve all seen delving into drug trafficking. Personally, even as a legal professional, and excluding any obvious affection I have for Atlantic City-based docudramas, I’d say far too many. Conversely, child sex trafficking, documentaries, and docudrama alike, due to their inherent and subjective nature, are not as publicized. Yet, Sound of Freedom informs us of those like-minded individuals, like myself, who have aided, funded, or sought out information dealing with child sex trafficking.
As the film poignantly reminds the viewer that there are more people, more children, and young adults, currently enslaved by the insidious grasp of sex trafficking than during any previous period times of legalized, non-consensual domestic slavery throughout history. Speaking to the nightmarish realities imposed on minors. As of right now, children, domestically and abroad, are forced to live through the unspeakable, unimaginable, unforgivable realities of trafficking victims. Experiences that aid, perpetuate, and fund international cocaine and opioids industries.
The purpose of Sound of Freedom is to sound the alarm, in the way that a dramatic feature film can do, and as journalism often cannot in a world of mass hysteria and political misinformation, is to take viewers into an era of child re-enfranchisement.
Moments worth mentioning include Roberto (Jose Zuniga), a single father in Honduras, who agrees to let his 11-year-old daughter, Rocio (Cristal Aparicio), and her 7-year-old little brother enter a music competition overseen by the glamorous Katy-Gisselle (Yessica Borroto Perryman), who gains control of perspective childhood participants. Instructed to drop his children off at an apartment building, where dozens of other child contestants were inside, and to return a few hours later to claim his children post-performance. When he does, the place is now dark, dank, and abandoned. Realizing he’s been deceived, seeks to find his children after finding out about the proverbial hell awaiting the siblings.
Later, Special Agent Ballard, while entrapping internet consumers of child porn, after twelve years of capturing 280-plus pedophiles, seeks to aid the case workers, wins the trust of his latest criminal discovers a link into a new trafficking chain, launches an operation to apprehend a new vein of traffickers. In doing so, saves a young boy from the film’s opening scene.
And the boy’s sister? Still trapped in the film’s central trafficking nightmare, Ballard makes her freedom, his mission. After Ballard and his wife, Katherine (Mira Sorvino), parents to six children themselves, share the film’s Christian view, with children being saved from trafficking extensions of their family- believing “All children are God’s children, and are therefore all of our children.”
Ballard, no longer connected to Homeland Security, and offered an off-the-books funding opportunity from his former supervisor, makes the decision to go after the traffickers themselves-with one week and one grand in-pocket. The film soon becomes an undercover thriller.
Ballard’s central contact, Vampiro, an American who used to launder drug money from cartels, and after spending a substantial time behind bars, helps his connection launch a fake members-only club for wealthy pedophiles, as a way of entrapping the local traffickers, including Katy-Gisselle, the beforementioned former beauty queen. A dirty, grotesque version of Miami Vice.
Ballard then travels down the river into the jungles of the Nariño Province, a rebel stronghold where the drug lord, Scorpio, has made Rocio his slave. Then, Ballard and Vampiro pose as United Nations physicians seeking to gain admittance to the rebel camp, a known cocaine factory. Whose manager, Alejandro Monteverde, stages a Rambo-esque scene. Where the deliverances become take-action, rather than take-away heart-of-darkness moments. we’ve been seeking arrives, it feels earned. In a conventional pulp way, we’ve glimpsed the heart of darkness. In typical take-action movie scenes. Leading the audience through an additional gritty, unpredictable, sinister two-hour look at saving the world’s greatest resource, our children.
This An Angel Studios release, featuring Eduardo Verástegui as producer, executive producers Jaime Hernandez, Patrick Slim Domit, John Paul Dejoria, Carlos Martinez, Anthony Robbins, Sean Wolfington, Whitney Kroenke, Sybil Robson Orr, Tim McTavish, Brian Norton, Delmont Truman, Matt Stover, Gladys Bolivar, Carlos Alvarez Bermejillo, Cecilia Coppel, Paul Hutchinson, Mickey O’Hare, Leo Severino, Christopher Tuffin, and Renée Tab, as well as direction from Alejandro Monteverde, and screenplay from Rod Barr, Alejandro Monteverde. Camera: Gorka Gómez Andreu, this is a must-see drama this season.
Angel Studio’s goal for Sound of Freedom is for two million people to go see the film in theaters the week of July 4- remembering the two million children who are trafficked annually. Propelling a movement that will save millions of kids around the world by watching this in theatres. You can find showtimes, here. For those seeking to help children, you can help pay for tickets so others may come to see the film, here. Helping the studio reach its goal of #2MillionFor2Million to help end child trafficking.
As previously mentioned, this movie was a film that everyone from the most principled to the most pragmatic can learn, feel, and empathize with. I recommend this film to others. From the film’s origin to its associated mission statement, remains its truest vantage point, “All children are God’s children, and are therefore all of our children.” While the film’s funding partners leave much to be desired, and its publicized aspects being tossed about underground media leaves my journalist’s heart saddened I can appreciate every aspect of this film. The film’s positive attitude and attribution, however disparaging in theme and available information, compared to other films and documentaries in its respective genre with greater respective information, including Lilya 4-Ever, Girl in Room 13, or The Whistle Blower, films sharing domestic trafficking practices, the film and its executive function do, however, leave my inner child at peace.
This is why I’ve partnered with Momentum who is giving one Theladyprefers2save.com reader a chance to watch this film themselves. Enter, here, for a chance to win a pair of tickets to view Sound of Freedom yourself this season in theatres-this contest will run from 7/4/23-7/7/23 at 11:59 p.m. central standard time. Enter by leaving a comment on this post as well as on my Instagram, Facebook, or Twitter pages. Good luck!
Friends, do you plan to watch this film in theatres? How do you celebrate trafficking survivors in your own walk? Leave your thoughts on this film in the comments below.
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