Eden, Film about Trafficking Survivor Chong Kim, a Huge Hit at SXSW Festival

Survivors Connect Network

In Chong Kim, trafficking on 2012/03/16 at 12:28 am

Based on the life of survivor/activist Chong Kim

Here at Survivor’s Connect we’re over the moon about the movie Eden, based on the life of sister survivor Chong Kim, who’s a fantastic activist, writer and artist.   Chong inspires trafficking/prostitution survivors everywhere she goes. She received screen credit for her story.  We’re teary, happy and proud.
Eden, starring Jamie Chung and Beau Bridges,  was a huge hit at the South by Southwest Arts Festival.  It won  the Women’s Director Award and the Narrative Feature Audience Award.  Jamie Chung won a special jury prize for her acting performance.
Here’s an excerpt of a rave review by Drew McWeeney:

I will definitely catch up with it, because I thought her new film, “Eden,” was a strong, simple presentation of a harrowing story, with a great performance from Jamie Chung to ground the whole thing.  Based on the real life of Chong Kim, who gets a co-story credit, “Eden” tells the story of a young Korean girl who works for her parents in their store and who is just starting to experiment with freedom, sneaking out with her friend, smoking cigarettes.  She’s very young, and despite her little white lies, she seems like a fairly innocent girl.
That ends one night when she uses a fake ID to go to a bar where she meets Jesse (Scott Mechlowicz).  She decides to go home with him, and instead ends up abducted, then driven to her new home, a prison-like bunker where she’s kept with other underage prostitutes.  The main face she sees each day belongs to Vaughan (Matt O’Leary), who works for Bob Gault (Beau Bridges), a law-enforcement officer who is running a fairly major network of flesh-peddling on many levels.

Read more here

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