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Because this movie really does nothing but reinforce outdated and completely wrong stereotypes.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...
