It’s Been One Year, Now… Can We Finally Just Call Out This Piece Of Shit Movie For What It Really Is…?
Theatrically Released As An Obvious Scam; The Idiots That Made This Creepy, Far Right Propaganda Fuckstain Are Conveniently Catering To A Delusional Male Q-Anon Fantasy And A Gullible, Anti-Intellectual Dipshit’s Wet Dream — Which Is Only Going To Be Part Of This Hilariously Abysmal Movie’s Legacy (yes, I watched it)
I’ve had conversations with only a few different people that have actually seen Sound Of Freedom, and its sorta weird how uncomfortable most of them are about being overly critical… because the film is about the epidemic of child sex trafficking; which — does not give Sound of Freedom a free pass to be a terrible fucking movie.
Has anyone also noticed how there was not a single peep from nearly every far right mouthpiece (at least not loud enough to show up in my news feed, surprisingly) about how Sound of Freedom wasn’t even nominated for any Academy Awards this past January…?
That’s no accident. And just about anyone who’s bothered to actually invest their valuable time into watching this dumpster fire of heavy-handed, agenda-first cinema knows exactly why it wasn’t even considered. No matter what their taste in movies is.
For Your Consideration, Nominate This Film Or Else You’re A Pedophile
For the record, movies with right-leaning ideologies are not automatically exempt from Oscar consideration.
The 2014 Chris Kyle docudrama, American Sniper, directed by Clint Eastwood, and starring Bradley Cooper as Kyle, received SIX (6) Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture, Best Adapted Screenplay, and Best Actor for Cooper; winning 1, Best Sound Editing; beating out Interstellar, Birdman and The Hobbit: The Battle Of The Five Armies — so I don’t want to hear anybody bitching about how Hollywood shuts down all conservative voices. Because in reality, they don’t.
If the movie’s decent, and Hollywood thinks it can make money off of it, then Hollywood will happily make that gamble.
And that’s sort-of the big difference between a film like American Sniper… and a film like Sound Of Freedom.
Regardless of where you are ideologically, and what you think of Chris Kyle, American Sniper, as a film — is pretty damn good. It’s well-made, well-acted, and well-written. It’s Clint Eastwood. So, it’s hardly a surprise that the film is decent. Not to mention, the filmmaking of Sniper has mass appeal, and reaches far beyond the approval of a stock, conservative ecosystem, or of what would typically be expected of any other right-leaning biopic.
In other words, and as with every other Clint Eastwood-directed film, the filmmaking comes first; and the agenda 2nd.
And this is what makes American Sniper a real film, while also keeping it from being a propaganda piece.
Sound of Freedom is NOT American Sniper on any level. Sound of Freedom is a shitload of fuck. Its purpose upon release is to be a part of the great bullshit American culture war, at the expense of real-life children who have been kidnapped, sexually abused, and trafficked.
And something sorta profound crossed my mind after plowing through one full viewing of Sound of Freedom…
A viewer can only hate a movie so much that they haven’t even seen. In order to have genuine disdain for any film, the viewer would have to allow said film to take two whole hours away from their precious existence; two hours that they’ll never get back.
I guess there’s a lot that can be said about Sound of Freedom, starring everyone’s favorite self-righteous whack job punchline, and ultra religious Q-Anon conspiracy theorist fuckboy — Jesus Christ himself, aka Jim Caviezel, and in what was easily 2023's most outrageously controversial film… but not for the reasons one might suspect, nor for those staunch SoF defenders who haven’t even gotten around to actually watching the damn thing.
If you’re unfamiliar with the details surrounding Sound of Freedom’s nutty reputation, then just Google “Sound of Freedom scandals” or “Sound Of Freedom box office controversy” because — Spoiler Alert — this film did not make its money in the same traditional way that every single other major motion picture released into theaters has to.
A Movie’s Politics Alone Are Not Enough To Determine Whether A Movie Is Bad Or Not…
Getting into Ballard’s “religious views” and background as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints — is practically its own article, so I’ll digress here…
This is a 2 hour and 10 minute movie in which over 10 of those minutes — are the end credits — as in, it has about as many names attached to it as a Marvel movie.
And despite all of the names (financial backers who helped to push the film through distribution) slapped at the ass end of the credits, it’s an all-around shallow project that no one who participated in should really be proud of.
Personally, I think financially backing another crowdfunded controversy, Terrifier 3, would be more noble. Also because you’d be backing a much better movie; a movie that doesn’t exploit the safety and well-being of children for political points, and an overall better end product.
Regardless of whatever good intentions there were when this movie’s production was completed back in 2018, those good intentions are nonexistent in this abysmal, finished product.
This film is a diversion tool for angry, uneducated deplorables — in particularly, man-children who believe that the whole world is out to get them; that their masculinity is being threatened, and in which being antiwoke is their entire identity — trolling through life without hobbies, or better yet — purpose; hardly even looking for purpose — in both desperation, and as a lazy excuse to pat themselves on the back for — denouncing child sex trafficking?
Really?
It’s like if I told you murder is bad. And then personally took it upon myself to become an activist, opposing murder in the most self-congratulatory way. Because murder is an epidemic that more people need to be informed about.
It’s like, no fucking shit child sex trafficking is wrong, and evil, and incomprehensibly sick.
Exactly whose moral compass needs to be recalibrated to understand this?
That’s a major indicator that the motives behind this film’s release should be questioned because I call bullshit on these patriots for not already understanding that child sex trafficking has sort of always been a big deal in that it’s a crime, and that it’s universally condemned by pretty much every sophisticated society in the world; and you can certainly tell this by the way that some countries punish criminals for it.
And yeah, I get it. I totally understand the urge to raise public awareness over such a horrific epidemic, but Sound of Fucking Freedom — is not the way to raise that awareness.
This isn’t a film for serious people.
This is a film for involuntarily celibate trolls that are desperate to misdirect others from thinking that they might be the real pedophiles. Yeah. I said it.
This is a film for miscalculated individuals. Particularly, individuals that call themselves patriots or Christians, while allegedly supporting every bigoted thing opposite of what is supposed to be Christian — because that’s the narrative that Fox News sold them.
These people, referring to the supporters and makers of Sound of Freedom, do not care about children.
Whether they’re being trafficked or not. This film has an obvious agenda first initiative. And being a good film is not really part of it.
It’s only because of who has been directly backing the film publicly, that it survived obscurity before inevitably winding up at the bottom of the bargain bin at Wal-Mart.
The Obvious Truth About One Of The Most Dishonest, And Single-Dumbest Feature Films You’ll Ever See In Your Lifetime
So, right out the gate, Sound of Freedom does something that immediately makes it suspect.
At the opening of the film, it has the balls to display the text based on a true story.
In reality, it’s probably about as based on a true story as The Texas Chainsaw Massacre; which also had the sense of humor to claim that it was based on a true story at the beginning of its opening text crawl prologue, in order to spark more interest, and sell more tickets during a time that was two whole decades before anyone could fact check, simply by using the internet. Texas Chainsaw Massacre is not based on a true story, by the way. It’s only loosely — VERY loosely — inspired by the shocking behavior, and rural hijinks of old-timey Wisconsin serial killer, and lovable body snatcher, Ed Gein.
In case you didn’t know that child sex trafficking is a real thing, the movie Sound of Freedom helps you out by dedicating its entire opening to a setup in which hired traffickers plot, and fool an everyday low-income family in Honduras into allowing their children to participate in a traveling modeling agency for children. Seriously. That’s the film’s opener.
And holy fucking dogshit, does this movie have the audacity — to uncomfortably set the tone for the next two hours of cringe; in ways that any rational viewer knows, the filmmakers were not intending.
Because in less than 10 minutes, this film already feels like it’s missing the point of its own supposed “message” when it’s borderline sexualizing the very same children that it’s so concerned about rescuing.
Exactly What Separates A Hero… From An Antihero
In the story that Sound of Freedom is trying to tell, Tim Ballard is the hero…er, no — wait… he’s actually an antihero… but the film Sound of Freedom thinks he’s… the hero?
So, yeah. A big problem is that the movie itself believes that deep down, Tim Ballard is not an antihero, but a hero. There’s really no other way around it.
Essentially, this is a story about a guy/special agent for the HSI, that breaks with the ranks of government officials that direct him on who, or what to investigate next.
Again, the film treats Ballard like he’s a hero; but once the entire shit sundae has melted… Ballard is no hero. He’s a vigilante, at least according to the film.
If you want to find dirt on Ballard, you don’t have to look hard. Even the opening paragraph of his Wikipedia page as of this writing, makes that particular side quest surprisingly convenient:
Now, a more stubborn, soft brained Ballard fanboy might feel compelled to make the point: “Alright, so Ballard’s a creep. Big deal. But so are other officials that have absolutely nothing to do with this story…”
Tim Ballard is a real person who vouches for this “true story,” so that automatically makes him a good guy, right? I mean, you would think that a real man of god/man of faith that prides himself in the rescuing of sexually abused minors from the wraths of reptilian pedophiles… that this government-defying vigilante, alpha-male-mormon badass would have the mental stability and good conscience to maybe not be grooming and sexually assaulting multiple women at a time… right?
If you want to dive down the Ballard sex-creep rabbit hole, be my guest; and trust me when I say that you could be there for a while.
Personally, I don’t really care how many children Ballard has supposedly rescued from the clutches of sex trafficking rings. From the few interviews I’ve seen, his entire demeanor reeks of an ulterior motive.
One interview I watched, between Ballard and multi-generational bullshit artist, and entrepreneurial guru with a stupid twinkle in his eye, Tony Robbins… Ballard explains how his only choice on who was to play him in the movie, was Jim Caviezel (oh jesus fucking christ, really??) because he (Ballard) knew that Caviezel was a man of faith, plus — Ballard loves the film The Count of Monte Cristo (as we all do), and it’s one of his favorite films.
Fair enough… until, of course, you get to know who Jim Caviezel really is.
So, no. I’m not personally impressed by what Ballard has done, regarding his vigilantism. The lengths that some people will go through to deter from the fact that they’re beyond capable of sexual assault in general, should come as no surprise.
Could ‘Sound Of Freedom’ Ever Have Been A Good Film?
If you look at a film like 2015’s Spotlight, the actual true story about the Boston Globe’s “Spotlight” team of investigative journalists that uncovered a shocking, decades-long coverup of widespread and systemic child sex abuse by numerous priests of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston — leading to one of the most horrific scandals that later turned out to be an international epidemic… it becomes apparent that this type of sensitive subject matter can be done correctly, when in the hands of thoughtful, skilled filmmakers.
In no way whatsoever, does the film Spotlight exploit, harm, or make light of the victims, or the villains, of this real life tragedy. Instead, it humanizes everyone. Because every character is based on a real-life person.
The filmmakers, and the actors, of Spotlight deeply cared about the film they were making. They knew exactly how carefully the material needed to be portrayed. Because real people and their reputations were to be considered.
In Sound of Freedom, absolutely no one is humanized. Every character is barely an archetype; a first draft example of what the characters could resemble… which is why it's so easy to forget at times while watching that — this fucking thing is supposed to be based on a true story. Well, that’s unfortunate.
Jim Caviezel doesn’t portray Ballard as someone that we can relate to; which would be perfectly fine, if the character wasn’t so fucking boring. We learn nothing about this character. He has no arc, no demons, no notable imperfections that are worth remembering. He’s just a man of faith who wants to save the children, and stop the pedophiles. Okay, great.
So, what’s his backstory…?
Well, he has a wife, and 7 kids.
Cool, bro. What do they get to do in the movie?
Well, see — the kids — they’re not really characters. I mean, they’re in the movie. But they’re just sort-of in the background. We don’t get to know any of them.
You mean Ballard’s kids, or the sex trafficked kids?
Well, neither actually. Every child in the movie is just a plot device. None of them do or say anything of importance in the entire story. To be honest, none of the children are really even characters. They’re just there to serve the plot but they’re not really given anything to do in the movie except look scared until Daddy Ballard comes to their rescue.
Okay, that’s fine. What does his wife do; how crucial of a role does she play into his struggle of going on this vigilante mission? How big is the fight between them? It must be huge. Does she threaten to leave him??
No, there’s no fight at all. She just sorta quietly supports him and gives him her consent while he does all the talking in the two or three scenes they share together.
Really?? You mean, she’s totally okay with him going on a dangerous mission involving criminal sex traffickers — and if something happens to him, she gets to raise 7 children by herself??
Yeah, she’s got no problem with it — at least from what we can tell; she just supports him. It’s not complicated at all.
So, Tim Ballard is not a very complicated man?
Oh, no he’s very complicated. At one point in the movie, one of the parents of a sex trafficked child asks him, “have you ever thought about what it would be like if something like this happened to your children?” And then Tim Ballard is all like, “Oh my god, I never thought about what it would be like if it happened to MY children?” And then he cries for two seconds, and is then like, “if I don’t save those kids and stop the pedophiles, then no one will.” He’s very deep.
…And does Tim Ballard’s character in the movie ever see the irony in any of this? Does he actually learn anything about himself from it?? Does he see the remarkable error in leaving the mother of his children at home while he goes off and fights pedophiles for weeks, and even months, on end — and also while his… well, now — former employer, does not have his back in this mission?
Well, no. You see, because he’s a man of faith, he has nothing else to learn about himself. He’s just a perfect individual, incapable of wrongdoing, unless of course our government sees otherwise. But since the film’s expected audience already doesn’t like the government, it won’t be hard for them to just blindly root for Ballard throughout the movie.
Fair enough. What happens to all of the children that he rescues; do they recover psychologically? Are they returned to their families, or do they remain in some sort of facility or orphanage…?
Oh. Fuck if I know. The film just assumes that no one gives a fuck about any of those things, I mean — this is The Tim Ballard Show, after all.
If I can be honest, Sound of Freedom seems to be portrying Tim Ballard as if he’s nothing more than a 2nd rate Expendables character...
Well, that’s because he kind of is.
It takes a very skillful, and more importantly, mature filmmaker, or set of filmmakers to achieve decency with a story like Sound of Freedom.
It requires a director like, say, Clint Eastwood, to — not so much do a story like this justice, as much as just make it a watchable movie in general.
Hypothetically, what is the balance between entertaining the audience and paying respect to the victims?
Meanwhile, Sound of Freedom just says — fuck all of that. We’re not going to respect the intelligence of the audience — hell, we’re not even going to bother trying to be a good B-movie — nor are we going to respect the victims, or their families. This is a Tim Ballard suckfest, is what this is, and if you have a problem with that then you’re probably a pedophile.
Which is where I draw the conclusion…
Sometimes, The Real Pedophiles Are The Ones Accusing Everyone Else Of Being Pedophiles
Two tables for three, in which two of the three people at the tables have numerous sexual assault allegations against them… but they’re still going to tell you about how much they care about children? Hilarious.
Make no mistake, Sound Of Freedom is an abomination. It’s an insufferable film, and one of the very worst I’ve ever seen. Watching it in silence, with full-attention should make any half-decent, self-aware person feel unclean.
By the way, The Tim Ballard Podcast features an awesomely awkward 3-way interview between Ballard, Donald “just inject it with bleach” Trump, and Q-Anon master fuckface Jim Caviezel. Personally, my favorite part is when Ballard sluggishly tries to make excuses for the U.S/Mexico border wall, and he just can’t seem to understand why it became so politicized. Real cute, Tim. Good thing everyone in the audience is a fucking idiot.
You can watch the full interview here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1ZNMkzk0Mk&t=894s
To claim that you are a man of god that cares about children who have been exploited to arguably the most sickening degree imaginable… but then you’re going to cozy up to an insurrectionist conman, with at least 25 accusations of sexual assault, including one civil suit where he was found liable for rape, and had to pay up $5 million to his accuser because of the overwhelming amount of evidence against him—??? And you’re going to seriously expect all of us to trust your judgement on anything that has to do with exactly how you saved the lives of others, including children…???
When a film blatantly tries to sell you a “hero,” while it’s already being politicized to apparently inform the public about its urgent, and important story… the message doesn't matter. Because there isn’t one.
Headlines such as this one, tell you everything you really need to know about Tim Ballard:
Because there are other special agents that still have the job that Ballard once had before he decided to go rogue, and become the subject of a shit movie that would have never been able to make all of its money without the studio making deals with many of the big movie theater chains to option-set, to where anybody with the money can buy out entire showtimes in auditoriums for half of the price that everyone else purchases a single ticket for, thanks to countless wealthy inhabitants of the far right echo chamber, who want to jump on board the “I’m not a pedophile, You’re a pedophile” train.
There are special agents whose professions still assign them to do exactly what Ballard used to do, and we don’t even know their names. And that’s because we’re not supposed to know their names. Those agents take their jobs seriously.
They’re not hanging out, bumping dickheads with Donald Trump and his underwhelming mushroom penis on their subscription-based podcast with the Count of Monte Cristo, who doesn’t believe in evolution and tells everyone that liberals drink the blood of infants (Yes. Jim Caviezel actually said that). These degenerate, dangerous clowns have conned their way into another stratosphere of arrogance and bullshit where they get to sit around and play professional victims all day.
I never thought I would ever see a special agent, with all of his advanced training, and psychological mastery — completely unable to see through the easiest morality test of all time: Orange Felon/Fascist Baby Huey aka Donald Trump.
Unless, of course, he’s just no better than he is.
