Sound of Freedom (2023)

As someone who was a victim of child sexual abuse myself and as someone who admittedly likes Trump (who praised this movie to no end) and also as a tiny bit of conspiracy nut and seeing all the mainstream media attack this movie and trying to smear it, I really, REALLY wanted to like and support and even praise this movie - but I just can't.

I have to admit that it's a bit difficult for me to agree with the mainstream media's warning about this movie, but they really are correct for once - sometimes they throw you curve balls like that. I mean after all, there was a time when I trusted the mainstream media and I lost trust in them not because they were mainstream, but because they just started to get a lot of things wrong. But that also means that if they get things right for once, I can't just categorically disagree with them.

And it's really not like they are just smearing this movie for no good reason. They do (for the most part) have a valid point. This movie does nothing to actually stop this crime or to help the victims or to help people recognize this crime when they see it. On the contrary, because it claims to be based on true events, it causes people to have a completely wrong impression about this and therefore makes it harder for people to detect it when it's happening, because this movie is less accurate in its depiction of the real world than a Liam Neeson action thriller. Actually, Liam Neeson's recent film "Memory" was pretty good and actually much more accurate in it's depiction of child trafficking than this movie.

Because this movie really does nothing but reinforce outdated and completely wrong stereotypes. This type of thing isn't something that mainly happens in South America or in "other" countries and children don't just get kidnapped out of the blue by complete strangers and against their will. The sad truth is that most cases don't involve a stranger at all, but someone the child trusts and the child isn't gonna come running to you begging for help, cause the truth is they are victims of years of extremely systematic and sophisticated psychological manipulation.

And the perpetrators aren't all tough guys either. Actually a lot of them are quite educated, sophisticated and female because they don't raise suspicion. And also it's not just about forcing the kids to make movies - that only plays a very, very small part, but this movie would have you believe that that's the main part - that's the smallest part by far! Most of the aspects involved are MUCH worse than "just" that.

And as much as I would love to think that there are plenty of officers (official or rogue) of government security agencies who are incorruptible and ceaselessly fight the "bad guys" in relentless sting operations, the reality sadly isn't as clear cut. Yes, sometimes SOME children do get rescued, but actually very rarely by police, much less government security agencies. Well, there was that ONE case in Bosnia where a policewoman and member of an international agency uncovered a human trafficking operation - but then again the people running it were her colleagues...

**_Sorta “Taken 4,” but starring Jim Caviezel and focusing on children enslaved by sex traffickers_**

A Homeland Security agent (Caviezel) in SoCal tracks down people involved in child pornography, but he decides to leave the agency to save children trapped in sex slavery, starting with a little boy from Honduras. He teams-up with a former cartel accountant (Bill Camp) to track down the kid’s sister in which he must eventually infiltrate a camp of Columbian revolutionaries in the Amazon jungle.

Made in 2018 but not released until 2023, “Sound of Freedom” is based on the real-life story of Tim Ballard, the founder of Operation Underground Railroad (O.U.R.). It features actual footage of children being captured by slavers on CCTV. Imagine a more gritty-realistic version of the “Taken” movies, with Liam being replaced by Caviezel, and that’s this film.

This is a well-done, eye-opening picture about the perverted human cockroaches amongst us, but it isn’t entertaining in the conventional sense for obvious reasons. It amusingly became anathema to Lefties, also for obvious reasons.

The flick runs 2 hours, 11 minutes, and was shot in Cartagena, Colombia with additional scenes done in Calexico, California.

GRADE: B-

Though at times I felt luck played a bit too much of an hand in this drama, it's still quite a potent telling of the story of dedicated real-life agent Tim Ballard (Jim Caviezel) who spent much of his time working for the US Government trying to thwart the activities of people traffickers. More specifically, of those odious and venal monsters who kidnap and trade in young children who are destined to populate the sex industry and end up drug addicts and diseased in the process. When he rescues a young boy from such a scenario, he discovers that his sister was also taken - and the youngster and his father implore Ballard to try to find her too. Impossible, you might think - but a lucky break points in the direction of a lawless area of the Colombian jungle where even the local army doesn't go. Working closely with a man with quite a murky past and now his highly useful general factotum Vampiro (Bill Camp), they head off, disguised as doctors, into the wilderness. Can he locate her? Can he rescue her and get out alive? No, there's not oodles of jeopardy about any of that - but this film really does use this seemingly impossible mission to shine a light on these disgusting practices that still thrive in ostensibly civilised, Christian societies. Cavielzel is on good form here offering us an hybrid of adventure and action coupled with a highly developed moral compass. Camp, likewise, delivers quite a charismatic effort and local copper Jorge (Javier Godino) adds an extra dimension proving that the Colombian authorities found this practice just as revolting as anyone else. It's not brutal nor particularly graphic, it just allows our own imagination to put two and two together here and is a really effective indictment of a behaviour that truly turns the stomach. From a creative perspective, the photography - especially in the jungle - is first rate and all-in-all this is a thought provoking enterprise that's well worth two hours of your time.

Seems like the guy combined a bunch of characters into a glorified version of himself. Unfortunately his puff-piece is boring. I know I am supposed to be disgusted by the pedos but everyone is disgusting. Below-standard revenge action/thriller movie with bloated run time. More like Sound of Boredumb.

a very noble idea, mediocrely made.