This movie had a lot of hoopla surrounding it. Being from Angel Studios (a Christian based production studio in Utah) I was surprised to see them come out with a movie like this. The hoopla I’m referring to, before I go off about the movie, is people spreading word about Disney holding this movie hostage since 2018 after the merger they did with 20th Century Fox. This is ignoring the parent/sister company of Angel Studios called VidAngel. A streaming service that not only provides media produced by Angel Studios, but also acquired other properties for the streaming service and illegally filtered through them. Breaking streaming and copyright laws. Making them file bankruptcy after being sued over 62 million dollars. What people also aren’t taking about is that the distribution of this movie was essentially crowdfunded. I’m not certain on the details of how or why. The law suit seems to be a really solid reason for such a thing. Staring the guy who Jesus in the Mel Gibson Jesus movie, it was either a recipe for disaster or their biggest success. The movie isn’t the worst film I’ve seen. It’s blatantly ruined by forced Christian ideology that the script kinda didn’t ask for. The reasoning for this heroism is almost selfish when you think about. When you watch the movie, and see some interviews, there’s a whole part where the guy’s wife tell him to quit his job and find this girl so he wouldn’t ruin her “salvation”. Idk how anyone find that endearing. This isn’t discrediting the incredible heroism of Tim Ballard, but the presentation is almost masturbatory in nature. The cinematography has its moments, and the actor playing Tim has his moments where I’m really feeling the moment. It’ll be ruined instantly by a line that sucks, a shot that sucks, or music that is straight up inappropriate for the scene we’re watching. Less is more in alot of ways, and the music in this movie really downplayed the severity of the situation. It was hard to take seriously at times. I’m glad I didn’t pay to see this, because I don’t wanna support brands like them. The movie had alot going for it. Unfortunately the cast in many ways, the writing, directing, cinematography, everything could’ve been worked on by a better team while achieving a better movie with a story that isn’t being promoted for having the message that “child sex trafficking is bad.” So is racism, murder, and eating poop. Those aren’t messages those are things we should just already know. Can you make a compelling story where those topics are explored? Absolutely. That’s not what happened here fully. It was so close to being a good movie. I almost stopped watching because it got boring. Two climaxes in a movie is too many which is another complaint I have. There are two very distinct parts where it felt as if we reached the climax of the film. For time I was like, “cool this is about to wrap up in a really cool way.” But then I realized I still had another 45 min to an hour left. I just got bored after a while. Don’t watch this it’s not worth your time.