Eden (2013)

It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

Watch something else. There are very few redeeming qualities to this film.

It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

One of the best movies of the year! Incredible from the beginning to the end.

How to describe this film? A sick fantasy about the modern day white slave trade, except the girls come in a variety of different colours. Eden is the daughter of Korean parents; she is kidnapped from a bar, transported to a remote secret prison, and schooled to be a prostitute. Prostitution is a voluntary act, so this is actually rape, but as the "johns" appear not to know the score it is her gaolers rather than them who are the rapists.What else do we have? If an organisation like this could exist in modern day America, it would require some inside men; here we have one corrupt law enforcement official, who early on murders two men in cold blood, one of them a fellow deputy. Eden is spirited, but after a failed escape attempt decides to throw in her lot with one of her captors, or does she? No, it is obvious she is only biding her time; best not to wait too long though, because an hour into the film her predecessor, Svetlana, is sleeping with the fishes.

This is a competent women in prison and in peril type of film with a wrapper of being based on true events. However the truth is questionable as the story involves a high ranking police official running an extensive, underground network of sex slaves who is killed. Well I am sure the TV news stations would be all over this story in the 1990s yet I have heard or seen nothing.The film is about a Korean-American Chong Kim, a 19 year old student on a night out is drugged, kidnapped and sold into sex slavery. She manages to survive, gain the trust of one of her abductors and manages to escape.The film is well made, competently acted, lurid and disturbing enough. At times equally gripping as well silly. However the tag line of the story being true overpowers the film as you see events unfold. We live in a 24 hours multi channel television world and no one has uncovered the truth which makes me doubt the veracity of this movie.

THE ABDUCTION OF EDEN (dir. Megan Griffiths) The film is supposedly based on the true story of an American based prostitution ring run by a high- ranking police official. However, the film merely recycles the themes of lurid sexual fantasies and physical abuse found in the 'Women In Prison' sub-genre of exploitation films of the 1960's. THE ABDUCTION OF EDEN (this seems to be the title of the film at Netflix) is a competently made 'B-Movie' with a first rate cast that employs the 'damsel in distress' plot-line to emphasize the very real issue of human trafficking. If this film is actually based on a true incident, I would really like to find out where and when that it occurred. However, whether or not it really happened as portrayed in this film, it certainly makes for an engaging story.

While the 2013 film year is only about half way over, I am almost positive that this will be in my "Best 10" list for the year. As others have already noted, I was completely surprised on how good this movie was, and I will say that had this been a true "Hollywood" movie with name stars and marketing muscle, this would be under strong consideration for Golden Globe and Oscar nominations. Perhaps it still has a chance for the independent Spirit awards, but we shall see. I did notice on IMDb that it previously won the "Audience Awards" at SXSW, Milan, San Diego and Seattle, so it has clearly touched a cord among many who have seen it.I felt the direction of this picture by Megan Griffiths was outstanding. It is a difficult tightrope to walk to present this film so that we see how bad it is, but not so bad that it becomes gratuitous and too upsetting to watch. I think she accomplished that.We usually see Jamie Chung in movies strictly as eye candy. However, she handles this very difficult role (where she is on camera for almost the entire film) in a very understated and believable way. It is hard for Asian women to find good roles in American cinema, but maybe this puts her in a better position to find more serious, meaty roles in the future.I've been surprised at the polarization of user reviews on IMDb. Usually these independent, art-house films receive universal acclaim on this site, and God help the one person who disagrees. This time, it appears people either love it or hate it. Put me down on the side of loving it.