Eden (Abduction of Eden) | |
---|---|
![]() | |
Directed by | Megan Griffiths |
Screenplay by | Richard B. Phillips Megan Griffiths |
Story by | Richard B. Phillips Chong Kim |
Produced by | Colin Harper Plank Jacob Mosler |
Starring | Jamie Chung Matt O'Leary Beau Bridges |
Cinematography | Sean Porter |
Edited by | Eric Frith |
Music by | Jeramy Koepping Joshua Morrison Matthew Brown |
Production company | Centripetal Films |
Distributed by | Phase 4 Films Cinema Management Group (International Sales Agent) |
Release date |
|
Running time | 98 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Eden(Abduction of Eden) is a 2012 American drama film about human trafficking. It was directed by Megan Griffiths, who co-wrote the screenplay with Richard B. Phillips and stars Jamie Chung, Matt O'Leary and Beau Bridges. The film was produced by Colin Harper Plank and Jacob Mosler through Plank's Centripetal Films production company. It was inspired by the story of Chong Kim, who claims that she was kidnapped and sold into a domestic human trafficking ring in the mid 1990s. [1] [2] [3] It had its world premiere at the 2012 South by Southwest Film Festival. [4]
In 2014, the non-profit organization Breaking Out claimed they had investigated Kim's story and concluded it was false and aimed to defraud charitable organizations. [5] [6] [7] [8]
Hyun Jae is an 18-year-old Korean-American girl living in New Mexico in 1994 with her immigrant parents. On a night out with a friend, Jae hits it off with a young firefighter at a bar, who offers to give her a ride. Jae later notices his badge is fake and attempts to escape, but is captured, bound, tapegagged and transported in the trunk of another car.
Jae is drugged and taken to an isolated warehouse, where her braces are removed, personal belongings taken away, and her captors put her an tracking anklet. Jae is introduced to Bob, a corrupt law enforcement official who was earlier shown killing two people in cold blood and who is the local leader of a sex trafficking ring, as well as his volatile, drug-addicted overseer, Vaughn. Bob informs Jae that he has information about her parents and that they will be harmed if she does not cooperate. He renames her Eden and gives her two days to adapt to her new life before she is forced to work. Eden endures daily pregnancy tests, being forced to star in pornographic films and being prostituted. During her first prostitution job, Eden attacks the client and tries to escape once again, but she's been recaptured, handcuffed and forced to stay overnight with her hands cuffed in a tub filled with ice. Vaughn is then confronted by Bob on the operation, resulting in him getting slapped.
One year passes, and Eden has adapted as much as possible to life in the operation and has befriended another girl named Priscilla, who is shocked to learn Eden is as old as she is (by now, almost 19). Priscilla tells Eden something unknown happens to girls who become "too old." Moments later, Priscilla herself is mysteriously taken away. Eden notices that Vaughn's trustee, a girl named Svetlana, has obtained the class ring she was given by her father the day of her abduction and makes an attempt to forcibly retrieve it from her until Vaughn and an enforcer pull her off. Vaughn forces Eden to swallow the ring, which she does, but Eden then volunteers to assist Vaughn in overseeing the operation, specifically with accounting. After working one night at a college fraternity party, Vaughn has Eden assist him in accounting from the frat brothers, and in recapturing two other girls who attempt to escape. Eden begins replacing Svetlana as Vaughn's trustee, answering phones and assisting with day-to-day operations, and is taken out of the sex work side of the operation.
Bob is shown leading a seminar on drug trafficking, but is questioned by detectives as he was placed by a GPS at the location of a missing deputy and landowner, the two people he killed earlier in the movie. Eden and Vaughn meet Bob later to dispose of bodies in the nearby lake, including Svetlana. Vaughn suddenly betrays Bob and brutally kills him on the boat, presumably because of his implication in the death of the deputy and landowner.
One day, while answering phones, Eden is taking a customer's order when the customer asks how much it will cost, which Eden knows is an indication that it is a police sting, but she takes the order anyway and says nothing. Eden and Vaughn take a girl to the house of a man named Mario, and Eden instantly recognizes him as the one who transported her to the warehouse in the trunk of his car. Eden goes to the bathroom and finds a room full of baby beds. She also finds Priscilla, who is heavily pregnant (why she was taken away, as she'd tested positive on one of the daily tests) and blissfully ignorant as to what will actually happen to her baby (he or she will be sold). Vaughn notices Eden being withdrawn on the way back, deduces that she found out what Mario's house is used for and attempts to force Eden to kill a girl in the desert to prove her loyalty, but she is stopped at the last minute by Vaughn.
Vaughn is informed that one of his enforcers have flipped on the operation, presumably because of Eden sending him to a sting. Eden is forced to start packing the girls for the move and is taken to Vaughn's house, where Vaughn informs her they are moving to Dubai. Eden realizes this could be her last chance to escape. While he is in the bathroom, she sprays Vaughn's meth pipe with chemicals that Vaughn inhales, killing him. Eden then cuts the tracking bracelet off her ankle, takes drugs and money from Vaughn's house, and goes to Mario's house. Eden attempts to negotiate Priscilla's freedom; Mario refuses but admits that he remembers Eden. He agrees to let her see Priscilla. While his back is turned, Eden injects Mario with drugs and kills him. Eden finds Priscilla, telling her her baby was sold, and they both escape the house. Eden finds a pay phone and calls her mother, hearing her voice for the first time in a year.
Eden was produced by Centripetal Films and filmed in Washington State in the summer of 2011, with a largely local crew and funding assistance from Washington Filmworks, a government supported non-profit organization that provides financial support for films produced in Washington State. The idea for the film came into being when screenwriter Richard B. Phillips contacted Chong Kim after reading a newspaper article about her account of being sold into and escaping a domestic human trafficking ring. Phillips then proposed the idea of writing a screenplay based on Kim's story. Kim agreed, and the two of them set about writing a story for the film. That story was later turned into a screenplay by Phillips. Plank then hired Megan Griffiths to revise the script, and later hired Griffiths to direct the film. [3]
Eden has a score of 82% on Rotten Tomatoes based on 33 reviews. [9] Robert Abele of the Los Angeles Times said the film was "never less than suspenseful, but rather than sentimentally pander to easy outrage, or indulge in icky women-in-distress titillation, the movie...zeros in on the details of how dignity can be stripped like bark from a tree, and the queasy determination it takes to stay alive in a living hell." [10] Jeff Shannon from Seattle Times awarded the film with 3 out of 4 stars and said that "Cruelty, bloodletting and death are evident throughout (frequently occurring just outside the frame), and Griffith's laudable discretion actually intensifies their impact." [11] Stephen Holden of The New York Times said that "Enough films about human trafficking have been made in recent years that the outlines of Eden should be painfully familiar. But that familiarity doesn't cushion this movie's excruciating vision." [1] Along with Holden's review Eden was also selected as one of New York Times Critics' Pick. [1] Stephanie Carrie of the Village Voice said "overall, this is a powerful addition to the small collection of films dedicated to spreading awareness of this horrific crime." [12]
Many critics particularly praised the performance of Jamie Chung. Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian said that "a very strong performance from Chung impresses". [13] Matthew Turner of ViewLondon said "Chung duly steps up, delivering an emotionally complex performance that requires her to keep her true feelings closely guarded (we also see her distance herself from her work by adopting a different persona)" and ended by saying that it was a "terrific central performance from Jamie Chung". [14] Stanley Kauffmann of The New Republic wrote "a quite moving performance comes from Jamie Chung as Eden, repulsion sliding into fearful acceptance without the extinction of hope." [15]
Some reviews were negative. Farran Smith Nehme of the New York Post called it "a Lifetime movie gone upscale-grindhouse" and criticized the South by Southwest festival's decision to give the film an award. Nehme also questioned the film's authenticity. [16] David Fear of Time Out said the film's second half "head[s] south of ludicrous, [and] Eden's goodwill dissipates." Fear also questioned the film's authenticity. [17]
On June 4, 2014, the non-profit anti-trafficking organization Breaking Out announced on their Facebook page that, after a year-long investigation of Chong Kim and her life, they had "found no truth to her story. In fact, we found a lot of fraud, lies, and most horrifically capitalizing and making money on an issue where so many people are suffering from [sic]." Breaking Out also accused Kim of defrauding several organizations out of charitable donations and announced a coming lawsuit. Later that day, Griffiths commented on her Twitter account, "I just heard about this today and it came as a shock. I am deeply concerned about it." [6] Eden's official website claims that "A portion of the net profits from EDEN will benefit anti-slavery organizations." [18] Kim responded on her Facebook page, stating "I don't appreciate you spreading lies about me … Whatever you claim to have I have the right to see it otherwise I will send you and your organization a formal complaint." [7]
After these accusations arose, Noah Berlatsky of Salon compared Kim to Somaly Mam and commented that the film was thickly layered with exploitation tropes and improbable scenarios. Berlatsky found it shocking that "anyone took this clearly fanciful, clearly derivative fiction for fact". [5] Journalist Elizabeth Nolan Brown criticized "the authors who repeated Kim's story, the journalists who interviewed her, the organizations that brought her on as a speaker, or any of the myriad people behind the 'based on a true story' Eden" for not checking and verifying Kim's claims. [7] Journalist Mike Ludwig argued that the narrative promoted by the film harmed consensual sex workers. [8] Seattle sex worker Mistress Matisse had been questioning the veracity of the film since 2012. [6] Matisse stated that Colin Plank and Megan Griffiths "perpetrated a fraud in their movie called Eden." [19]
The Stranger journalist David Schmader had previously called the film a masterpiece and the best film ever made in Seattle, [20] but has since called its back story "bullshit." [6] Stranger writer Jen Graves was highly critical of Griffith's lack of research into Kim's story and regretted her initial support of the film. Since Breaking Out first made their allegations, Griffiths and others directly associated with the film have refused to comment further, [19] but the film's official website continues to promote the film as "Inspired by the harrowing true story of Chong Kim." [21] In 2012, Griffiths won the Stranger Film Genius Award. Charles Mudede, a Stranger writer and former winner of the award, wrote that Eden had "secured her nomination" and was "a masterpiece". [22]
On June 25, 2014 Kim's PR firm Bradshaw & Co. publicly denied the allegations and referenced a pending lawsuit. [23] Since its initial allegation, Breaking Out has continued to release information about Kim on their Facebook page, including court documents detailing Kim's 2009 felony charge of theft by swindle, for which Kim was ordered to pay $15,000 [19] "to another human trafficking victim and activist in Minnesota." [8]
The film premiered at the 2012 South by Southwest film festival, where it won the Audience Award for Best Narrative Feature, Special Jury Recognition for Best Actress, Jamie Chung, and the award for Emergent Narrative Female Director, Megan Griffiths. [24]
It also won the Golden Space Needle Award for Best Actress, Jamie Chung and the Lena Sharpe Award for Persistence of Vision; Seattle Reel NW Award at the 2012 Seattle International Film Festival. [25]
It also won the Audience Award for Best Film at the 2012 San Diego Asian Film Festival. [26]
Eden was released theatrically in North America by Phase 4 Films on March 20, 2013 at Film Forum in New York City. [27] It also played theatrically in Los Angeles and Seattle, followed by a release on VOD on April 20, 2013. It was released on DVD on June 11, 2013. The DVD and Blu-ray were released in the UK by Queensway Digital Ltd on September 9, 2013. [28]
A May 2013 screening in Seattle included a panel discussion about human trafficking sponsored by Hope for Justice and the World Affairs Council of Seattle, with panelists including Washington State senator Jeanne Kohl-Welles and YouthCare social worker Leslie Briner. Kohl-Welles had sponsored an anti-sex trafficking bill in the Washington State congress earlier that year [29] and would be a major supporter of the Motion Picture Competitiveness Bill. [30] Kohl-Welles and Griffiths were later panelists of the 2014 Seattle Film Summit, which called Kohl-Welles "the most vocal and reliable supporters of the State's film industry", [31] and Griffiths spoke at an October 2014 fundraiser in support of Kohl-Welles's re-election. [32] [ relevant? ]
The international distribution rights were licensed by Cinema Management Group. [33]
Grace Quek, known professionally as Annabel Chong, is a Singaporean former pornographic actress who became famous after starring in an adult film that was promoted as the World's Biggest Gang Bang. The film was commercially successful and started a trend of "record-breaking" gang bang pornography. Four years later, Quek was the subject of the documentary Sex: The Annabel Chong Story, in which she was interviewed about her pornography career. She retired from the adult industry completely in 2003 to work in software engineering.
Kim Hyo-jin is a South Korean actress and model. She began modeling in teen magazines, and made her acting debut in 1999. She made her theater debut in 2009 in the play A Midsummer Night's Dream and followed this up by appearing in the theatrical production Fool for Love a year later. She is best known for playing the youngest of the three sisters in sex comedy film Everybody Has Secrets (2004), a con artist in the television drama Private Lives (2020) and a top star in Castaway Diva (2023).
Scott David Mechlowicz is an American actor. He is known for appearing in the films Mean Creek (2004), EuroTrip (2004) and Peaceful Warrior (2006).
3-Iron is a 2004 South Korean-Japanese romantic drama film written, produced and directed by Kim Ki-duk. An international co-production between South Korea and Japan, the film stars Jae Hee as a young drifter who develops a relationship with an abused housewife. The film's title is derived from a type of golf club used prominently throughout the narrative.
Lydia María Cacho Ribeiro is a Mexican journalist, feminist, and human rights activist. Described by Amnesty International as "perhaps Mexico's most famous investigative journalist and women's rights advocate", Cacho's reporting focuses on violence against and sexual abuse of women and children.
Natalie Diane Grant is an American singer and songwriter of contemporary Christian music. She received the Gospel Music Association's Dove Award for Female Vocalist of the Year four consecutive years, 2006–2009, and a fifth award in 2012. She has also been nominated for eight Grammy Awards.
Jamie Jilynn Chung is an American actress and former reality television personality. She began her career in 2004 as a cast member on the MTV reality series The Real World: San Diego and subsequently through her appearances on its spin-off show, Real World/Road Rules Challenge: The Inferno II. She is regarded by many as the Real World alumna with the most successful media career.
Taken is a 2008 English-language French action-thriller film directed by Pierre Morel from a story written by Luc Besson and Robert Mark Kamen. It stars Liam Neeson, Maggie Grace, Katie Cassidy, Famke Janssen, Leland Orser and Holly Valance. In the film, Bryan Mills is an ex-CIA officer who sets to track down his teenage daughter Kim and her best friend Amanda after they are kidnapped by Albanian human traffickers while travelling in France during a vacation.
East of Eden is a 2008 South Korean television series, starring Song Seung-heon, Yeon Jung-hoon, Lee Da-hae, Han Ji-hye, Park Hae-jin and Lee Yeon-hee. It was produced by Chorokbaem Media as a 47th Anniversary Special Project Drama for MBC, on which it aired from August 25, 2008, to March 10, 2009, on Mondays and Tuesdays at 21:55 for 56 episodes. The ₩25 billion drama tells the story of the brothers Dong-chul (Song) and Dong-wook (Yeon). Their fates diverge after the murder of their coal miner father, with one joining the mob and the other becoming a successful lawyer.
Sunitha Krishnan is an Indian social activist and chief functionary and co-founder of Prajwala, a non-governmental organization that rescues, rehabilitates and reintegrates sex-trafficked victims into society. She was awarded India's fourth highest civilian award the Padma Shri in 2016.
The Whistleblower is a 2010 Canadian biographical drama film directed by Larysa Kondracki and starring Rachel Weisz. Kondracki and Eilis Kirwan wrote the screenplay, which was inspired by the story of Kathryn Bolkovac, a Nebraska police officer who was recruited as a United Nations peacekeeper for DynCorp International in post-war Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1999. While there, she discovered a Bosnian sex trafficking ring serving and facilitated by DynCorp employees, with international peacekeepers looking the other way. Bolkovac was fired and forced out of the country after attempting to shut down the ring. She took the story to BBC News in the UK and won a wrongful dismissal lawsuit against DynCorp.
She Has a Name is a play about human trafficking written by Andrew Kooman in 2009 as a single act and expanded to full length in 2010. It is about the trafficking of children into sexual slavery and was inspired by the deaths of 54 people in the Ranong human-trafficking incident. Kooman had previously published literature, but this was his first full-length play. The stage premiere of She Has a Name was directed by Stephen Waldschmidt in Calgary, Alberta in February 2011. From May to October 2012, She Has a Name toured across Canada. In conjunction with the tour, A Better World raised money to help women and children who had been trafficked in Thailand as part of the country's prostitution industry. The first performances of She Has a Name in the United States took place in Folsom, California in 2014 under the direction of Emma Eldridge, who was a 23-year-old college student at the time.
Nefarious: Merchant of Souls is a 2011 American documentary film about modern human trafficking, specifically sexual slavery. Presented from a Christian worldview, Nefarious covers human trafficking in the United States, Western and Eastern Europe, and Southeast Asia, alternating interviews with re-enactments. Victims of trafficking talk about having been the objects of physical abuse and attempted murder. Several former prostitutes talk about their conversion to Christianity, escape from sexual oppression, and subsequent education or marriage. The film ends with the assertion that only Jesus can completely heal people from the horrors of sexual slavery.
Gu Family Book is a 2013 South Korean television series starring Lee Seung-gi and Bae Suzy. The fusion martial arts action historical drama is about a half-man half-monster who is searching for a centuries-old book that according to gumiho legend, contains the secret to becoming human.
Megan Griffiths is a film and television director who resides in Seattle, Washington, U.S., and is a board member of Northwest Film Forum.
Not My Life is a 2011 American independent documentary film about human trafficking and contemporary slavery. The film was written, produced, and directed by Robert Bilheimer, who had been asked to make the film by Antonio Maria Costa, executive director of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. Bilheimer planned Not My Life as the second installment in a trilogy, the first being A Closer Walk and the third being the unproduced Take Me Home. The title Not My Life came from a June 2009 interview with Molly Melching, founder of Tostan, who said that many people deny the reality of contemporary slavery because it is an uncomfortable truth, saying, "No, this is not my life."
Operation Stormy Nights was an early major anti-human-trafficking operation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Operations took place in Oklahoma and brought to light organized crime networks trafficking female minors along United States Numbered Highways, where the girls were forced into prostitution to service truck drivers.
Invisible Chains: Canada's Underground World of Human Trafficking is a 2010 book about human trafficking by Benjamin Perrin. Perrin wrote the book after researching human trafficking for ten years. In Invisible Chains, Perrin recounts a variety of stories of human trafficking in Canada, including that of the prostitution of a child in Ontario whose sexual services were advertised in the adult services section of Craigslist. The book was timed to be published within three weeks of the release of Joy Smith's proposal for the National Action Plan to Combat Human Trafficking. Perrin advocated adopting Smith's proposal, saying that Invisible Chains "shows that while traffickers have a plan, Canada doesn't," and that the victims are the ones who suffer from the lack of a national action plan. Perrin promoted the book in Winnipeg, Manitoba in October 2010. Mark Milke of the Calgary Herald said that Perrin's book is "not an enjoyable read. It's depressing... but it's a necessary read," going on to say that Invisible Chains "will do much good." University of Manitoba professor Joan Durrant praised Invisible Chains, calling it a powerful book. Chester Brown condemned Invisible Chains, saying that it purports "that johns are evil monsters." In response, Brown wrote Paying for It, a graphic novel written "from the john's point of view, since of course, I don’t think of myself as an evil monster." Perrin's book was nominated for a George Ryga Award for Social Awareness in Literature, but lost to One Story, One Song, an essay collection by Richard Wagamese.
Doctor Stranger is a 2014 South Korean television series starring Lee Jong-suk, Jin Se-yeon, Park Hae-jin and Kang So-Ra. It aired on SBS from May 5 to July 8, 2014 on Mondays and Tuesdays at 21:55 KST (UTC+9) for 20 episodes.
Every Step You Take is an 2015 Hong Kong modern romance television drama created and produced by TVB, starring Moses Chan and Myolie Wu as the main cast. Filming took place from March 2014 to June 2014. The drama is broadcast on Hong Kong's Jade and HD Jade channels from August 31 till September 25, 2015 airing every Monday through Friday during its 8:30-9:30 pm timeslot with a total of 20 episodes.