With over $200 million made at the global box office, you cant ignore the journey that Sound of Freedom has had in 2023. The story for its productionbegan back in 2015 and filming itself began in the Summer of 2018 and filming completed that same year. Due to the Disney takover of Fox, the film soon found itself shelved and the filmmakers eventually bought the distribution rights back from the studio, hence 2023’s Sound of Freedom and not 2018’s Sound of Freedom.
Of course the theories ran rampant across the internet about the film and its subject matter and as often is the case with media nowadays. the battle lines were drawn. Whilst I did see many of the politicised postings, I stayed away from commenting on those, as I hadn’t yet seen the film. Until now.
So what is Sound of Freedom about? The Internet Movie Database has the synopsis as the following
“The incredible true story of a former government agent turned vigilante who embarks on a dangerous mission to rescue hundreds of children from traffickers.” (the film opens with ‘Based On A True Story’ as a credit) and whilst I don’t doubt there is anything we see in the film that hasn’t happened somewhere in the world (and unfortunately likely still is happening somewhere in the world). Based On A True story is probably pretty accurate although whether the scenes played out in the film happened the way the film says they happened is open to debate but I would just say watch the film for the film, not as a documentary. I’m also not sure id class Tim (played by Jim Caviezel as a vigilante though, hes more a special agent who quits his job to go on a mission- Charles Bronson he isnt!)
There is of course much debate about the ‘true story’ part of that, and whilst of course child trafficking is a thing, its the other elements of the story that I have seen many people arguing about via their keyboards and so for the sake of me not getting involved in a keyboard war, I am going to focus solely on the film itself, and the performances within the the film.
Sound of Freedom is a really well made and performed thriller especially by some of the child actors, namely Lucás Ávila who plays Miguel, who has some scenes that will break your heart, and also Cristal Aparicio who plays his older sister Rocio. Very powerful performances indeed.
Perhaps some elements near the end of the film felt very Cannon Films from the 80s type cinema where it goes a bit ‘one man on a mission’, but overall the Sound of Freedom is gritty as hell,super creepy as you’d expect, its not an easy film to watch, especially in the first half, also as you’d expect, and perhaps isn’t the sort of film you are going to rewatch very often. Then again I don’t think its meant to be a rewatchable film. its an impact film. Its the sort of film that when you settle down to watch it, you are creeped out, you are disturbed and also repulsed by so many of the adult characters in this film. It is a film that will hit you and that’s what its meant to do. So overall the experience of Sound of Freedom is definitely an experience, its not the sort of film that needs a bucket of popcorn. its the sort of film that requires you pay attention to it and its the sort of film that makes your brain angry.
frompage2screen.com 