Movies entertain us. Movies captivate us. Some movies save people’s lives. Sound of Freedom is that film. You do not want to miss this movie.

I knew little about Sound of Freedom when I recently joined friends at the theater. (I never want to know too much about a film before I see it. I like to be surprised by the action. The creative in me likes to figure out plots myself.) So I won’t spoil the film for you, but I will tell you the movie is based on a remarkable true story of a few brave souls who risk their lives to rescue children from sex trafficking.

While the subject of the film is intense, viewers are not exposed to gross images and bloody violence. You’ve seen worse on weekly TV dramas and the nightly news. Sound of Freedom reaches past the “oh, that was a good film” to shake your mind and heart. Too often in our world today we are unaware of how others are innocently drawn into a lifestyle they never, ever would choose.

Meet Mariel in Manila

I’ll never forget one of my overseas magazine assignments in the Philippines. I was there to report on how one married couple’s outreach to prostitutes was rescuing these women from giving away their bodies to men who treated them as dispensable commodities.

On a muggy May afternoon, Mariel* led me along the dank back alley to her family’s home—a maze of carefully placed cardboard boxes secured with chicken wire. Really? Seriously? I stooped almost to a crawl to wedge inside the tunnel that led to a “two-story” living area. Mariel, a Filipino prostitute in Manila was now selling Tupperware^® to get herself off the streets. She proudly showed me where she, her husband and young children lived. A throwaway box mansion between dumpsters and other squatter families’ similar corrugated carton homes.

I remember Mariel being one of untold numbers of Filipinos from outlying villages whose families are approached by “businessmen from the city” who offer regular wages for their teen girls to work in the restaurant and hospitality industry. These entrepreneurial men (i.e. pimps and sex traffickers) typically give the family a substantial upfront payment and later the girls send money home regularly. The parents have no idea their daughter(s) are now “owned” by these generous employers who visited their village.

All of Us Can Turn This Around

Sound of Freedom reminded me of Mariel and other underage children who are unknowingly sold to beyond despicable fiends. But you know what? It doesn’t have to be this way. Go see Sound of Freedom and learn what all of us can do to turn around the unthinkable happening even in our own U.S. communities.

There’s an indelible line from Sound of Freedom that sticks with you: “God’s children are not for sale.” They are not. His children—including you and me—are forever precious in His sight.

Movies entertain us. Movies captivate us. Some movies save people’s lives. Sound of Freedom is that film. You do not want to miss this movie.

P.S. Sound of Freedom is currently #3 at the box office, grossing more than the latest Indiana Jones and Mission: Impossible flicks.