It’s summer, a time for backyard barbeques, ballgames, and trips to the beach. It’s also summer blockbuster time at your local movie theater. While there’s been a lot of buzz surrounding 80-year-old Harrison Ford’s reprisal of Indiana Jones in that franchise’s latest installment, one film that does not have the multi-million dollar backing of The Walt Disney Company has given ol’ Indy a run for the money, Sound of Freedom.
Sound of Freedom hit theaters on Independence Day and promptly out-grossed “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny” on its opening day. This film stars The Passion of the Christ lead Jim Caviezel as Tim Ballard, a real-life Homeland Security agent who quits his job and ventures to Colombia to save children from the evils of human trafficking.
This true story reveals the horrors of the international child sex slave trade, where according to The Child Advocacy Center, “About 2 million children are exploited every year in the global commercial sex trade.” To make matters worse, Caviezel says, “the United States is the biggest buyer of trafficking pedophilia in the world, and Mexico being the biggest producer of it, with over 300,000 children being taken into the United States under the age of 18.” The sex trade is estimated to be a $99 billion dollar a year industry,
Sound of Freedom was produced in 2018 as a 20th Century Fox project but was shelved when the studio was acquired by the Walt Disney Company. The film only saw the light of day after it was bought by Angel Studios, producers of The Chosen streaming television series.
Sound of Freedom addresses an exploding problem that Ballard says is the “fastest-growing criminal enterprise in the world”. While this degenerate enterprise is uncomfortable to discuss, the conversation must take place. Ballard’s first-hand accounts of what children face as sex slaves is both appalling and unbelievable. They’re subjected to multiple daily rapes and when the traffickers are done with them years later, they’re “opened up and their organs are sold”.
Sound of Freedom’s producer, Eduardo Verastegui, who also appears as a billionaire financier, wants to use it as a catalyst for a movement to educate people and inspire them to get involved in ending the ghastly scourge of child sex trafficking. You can help him in this effort by buying tickets to Sound of Freedom and telling everyone you know about this important film. Angel Studios also gives you the opportunity to pay it forward and purchase tickets for someone to claim at movie theaters.
Sound of Freedom tells a story that must be heard no matter how unnerving its subject matter. Child sex trafficking is a global problem that gets worse each year and depraved predators must be exposed and prosecuted. Caviezel and Verastegui are on a mission to save these victims because, as Caviezel’s character states in the movie, “God’s children are not for sale.”
Andrew Mangione is Senior Vice President of AMAC Action, a 501(c)(4) nonprofit conservative advocacy organization, created to serve as the advocacy affiliate of the Association of Mature American Citizens (AMAC). He also serves an AMAC national spokesperson.