Trade of Innocents

I won't slam this film for being a poorly disguised Christian-value morality pusher. I won't knock it for it's 3rd-grade script and monotone actors. I'm not even going to examine the scores of plot-holes and racist inaccuracies present in an obviously NGO-funded and bible- thumper backed waste of space in my BitTorrent stream.

Instead I'd like to point out that this film, supposedly made about Cambodia and "based on real events" has:

a) Not a single Cambodian actor in the entire film

b) Not a single line of dialog that sounds Khmer

c) Not a single actual shot of Cambodia, Siem Reap, or Angkor Wat

d) Not a single shred of present-day reality

This movie will only shock & surprise those whom are easily fooled. The flimsy story-line and cheesy dialog, "I trained my whole life for this!", are enough to make milk curdle. Yeah, we know child trafficking sucks, we know people are working to stop it, but we're not dull enough to believe that it's as black & white as it's poorly portrayed here.

The thing that really gets me is that I saw the three actors, the only white guys in the movie, out together in Soi Cowboy during the making of the film. Really? You're gonna make a movie about how terrible the sex trade is and then go get a 16-year-old lap dance and boom boom when you've punched off the clock?

Scratch what I said above. There was one thing right about this movie, the pedophile go away in the end. That's what happens in 99.999% of the cases, they go back home from their holiday without hassle (incidentally, 19 out of 20 sex trade customers come from the same continent).

I wish filmmakers could stop themselves from making films about a country that they know nothing about and can't even bring themselves to hire someone from that country to help make the movie. It's insulting, demeaning, and racist. But hey, what do I know, Thais, Cambodians, Vietnamese -- heck, even Chinese -- they all look the same and a stupid Western audience won't be able to see or hear the difference, right?

I really want to like this movie and rate higher as an honest living person for its contents alone, but as a movie freak it was easy to say the screenplay was a letdown. Not based on the actual incident, but the film depicts how and where these things take place. In fact inspired by the director and producers of this film's own experience during a visit to the Cambodia. This was a movie about human trafficking, in the line of movies like 'Trade' and 'Eden'.

An American couple who recently lost their child on a mission in a Southeast Asian city to fight the crime. What they encounter is the crux of the story. Don't anticipate breathtaking stunts and wide human traffic network like the movie 'Taken'. As I expected in this low budget movie, everything was too short including the cast with a simple story. But there is a powerful message, that's the most important and everything else is just a formality for a movie to have a basic thing. Watch it or not its up to you, because in one way worth give a try and in another, it is not.

6/10

Even well-made films dealing with truly disturbing issues have a hard time finding a sensitive and appreciative audience. This film unfolds like the great films of old when storytelling and solid acting were as much appreciated as people jumping off a hundred story building and everything blowing up (I like those movies too but sometimes I don't mind having to think when watching a film). Trade of Innocents is compelling to watch, makes me want to take action, all the while caught-up in a beautiful shot film with actors I have always enjoyed. Sometimes the best films simply make you feel something very human. This one did that for me and I don't ask movies to do much more. I'm glad I saw it.

I've seen some of the other reviews on this movie and am saddened that people seem more concerned about quality acting, than the point that children are being sold as sex-slaves, right now, today! It shows how numb the world has become to horror. The heart of this movie will touch yours, I hope. But this film also reminds us of the importance of art, the power of media, and will stir you up to share, like, tweet, post, whatever else you can do to a) raise awareness of the heinous crime, and b) help prevent it happening. If it saves ONE little girl, or ONE little boy from this horror, isn't it worth it. Besides that, I actually think the storytelling is really strong, the characters have great arc, and Oscar-winner Miro Sorvino is just fantastic. The bad guy is appropriately disgusting and tormented. I would STRONGLY recommend this movie to anyone who cares about life.

So many films on child and human trafficking are coming out, it's hard to keep up. Trade Of Innocents is a well meaning film on the subject. It just isn't the best. It concerns a grieving couple (Sorvino and Mulroney), trying to come to terms with the death of their daughter. They support a organization, helping to rescue kids who are being pimped out, to foreign pedophiles, as such a middle aged guy (a creepy John Bilingsley- Croc 3). He's the stereotypical pedophile, where they're are so many instances in Trade Of Innocents, that are clichéd, it's tense building up to finale, kind of strengthens it, livens it, and redeems it, but by this time, it's really too late. I did find bits of the film, were just weak and linear. I like Dermot Mulroney, and it was good to see him here, as I haven't seen much of him nowadays, but one feels he was miscast, where obviously Sorvino, outside of acting, has taken a personal and vested interest in this cruel trade, very much mirroring her character in Human Trafficking, where here, she's not as strong a character as she was in the latter, but shows the same initiative. The Aussie who's part of the anti trafficking organization, was a different angle, but desperate one, as was stereotypical like how his fate turned out and going undercover to buy some girls, as you see in many HT documentaries, like Dateline whatever, where too a nice bike chase, added some other tension, besides the norm of scenes you see in these slavery dramas. The film does throw in some smart tricks, as in Mulroney's character, like surreptitiously taking a photo of child and pedo in a bar, but really doesn't change the fact that this is just a more weaker film as to say Human Trafficking, Trade or Lilet Never happened. Yet still the film shows a likable initiative in a not so bad drama, for people who like this topic, a manifold of dramas probe.