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Sound of Freedom Movie Review

Sound of Freedom is a 2023 crime thriller film directed by Alejandro Monteverde and starring Jim Caviezel. It is a film that ignited conversation, but it didn’t really deserve it.

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“God’s children are not for sale“

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It tells the true story of a former government agent turned vigilante who embarks on a dangerous mission to rescue hundreds of children from traffickers. This indie movie was supposedly in the works for many years until finally it was released with a bang. It was a surprising box office hit, but it also ended up igniting so much controversy.

Let’s first talk about the politics behind this movie and the culture war that it started off unfortunately. The right-wing media in the US and the general moviegoing public reacted enthusiastically to the point of calling the film a masterpiece. Is it that great? It’s not of course, but more on that later.

My bigger issue is with the left-wing media that bashed the movie by painting it as this overly religious film with problematic messaging, which simply wasn’t the case. Most of the writings done on this movie were either huge exaggerations or plain fabrications. It just goes to show how horrendous anti-rightist bias is in this country and how they all failed to unite over such an important issue speaks more about the left than the right in this instance.

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But let’s talk about the movie itself, which is anything but great. It’s not even good either. It’s a passable flick that is yet another crime thriller done in the vein of so many of those popcorn movies that we see over and over again with ‘Sicario’ springing to mind immediately as a reference point.

Yes, the child trafficking issue is truly horrendous and if even a fraction of what this film depicted is true, then we have a huge problem that needs to be solved, so the fact that they would attack a film dealing with this subject matter is in and of itself extremely troubling. But my problem with the movie is that it failed to approach this sensitive subject properly.

Jim Caviezel was good in the main role, but his character got to cry and act all brooding way too often, making for a cringe-worthy performance and characterization. Others fared even worse as their characters either lacked substance or were overly goofy and unrealistic with the villains faring the worst.

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But the biggest problem with Sound of Freedom is that just wasn’t as engaging or as intense as you’d think this type of film would be. Those who were horrified with this movie were terrified by the subject matter solely and not the content. I am not in favor of showing gratuitous violence, but here the film was overly timid, slowly paced and narratively unambitious to make a bigger emotional impact. It’s technically well made with solid cinematography, score and editing, but it needed better direction, more earned instead of manipulative emotions and a stronger screenplay overall.