Holly (film)

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Holly
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Guy Moshe
Produced by	Adi Ezroni Guy Jacobson
Written by	Guy Moshe Guy Jacobson
Starring	Ron Livingston Chris Penn Virginie Ledoyen Udo Kier Thuy Nguyen
Music by	Tôn-Thât Tiêt
Cinematography	Yaron Orbach
Editing by	Isabela Monteiro de Castro
Distributed by	Easternlight Films
Release date(s)	2007
Running time	113 min
Country	United States
Language	English Khmer Vietnamese
IMDb profile

Holly is a 2007 drama film about an American stolen artifacts dealer in Vietnam who tries to save a young girl from child traffickers. The film was directed by Guy Moshe, and stars Ron Livingston, Chris Penn, and Thuy Nguyen.

Shot on location in Cambodia, including many scenes in actual brothels in the notorious red light district of Phnom Penh, HOLLY is a captivating, touching, and emotional drama.

Patrick (Ron Livingston), an American card shark and dealer of stolen artifacts, has been ‘comfortably numb’ in Cambodia for years, when he encounters Holly (Thuy Nguyen), a 12-year-old Vietnamese girl, in the K11 red light village. The girl has been sold by her impoverished family and smuggled across the border to work as a prostitute.

Holly’s virginity makes her a lucrative prize, and when she is sold to a child trafficker, Patrick embarks on a frantic search through the both beautiful and sordid faces of the country, in an attempt to bring her to safety. Harsh, yet poetic, this feature forms part of the ‘K-11’ Project, utilizing mass media to raise awareness of the global child trafficking epidemic. The producers are executing the K-11 Project in conjunction with their non-profit, the RedLight Children Campaign, which is a worldwide grassroots initiative generating conscious concern and inspiring immediate action against child sexploitation.

PRODUCERS’ NOTE

GUY JACOBSON:

In 2002, while travelling on a sabbatical, I encountered a group of 5 to 7 year old girls in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, who aggressively tried to solicit me for prostitution. One of the girls, about 6 years old, said "I yum yum very good. I no money today. Mama San boxing me (the madam of the brothel will beat me up)." I gave them some money and walked away, but decided to do something about it.

As I started to research this subject, I was horrified to realize that around 2 million children (some younger than a year old) are kidnapped and sold into prostitution and sexually abused world wide each year. I had heard about underage prostitution before but I never realized the proportions of the problem. I vowed to do everything in my power to raise global awareness and action about this crucial social problem.

The product of this decision was to create a combination of a three-film project and an international grassroots movement to decrease child prostitution, sexual exploitation and child trafficking. I have spent most of the last 6 years trying to make it happen.

HOLLY is the spearhead of the whole campaign and I can only hope that it will put this issue on everybody’s agenda.

ADI EZRONI:

When I met Guy in 2004, I was an Israeli actress on vacation in New York. Our meeting and the decision to produce this project changed my life.

Producing this project has been an uphill battle, and sometimes seemed more like a war. When we arrived in Cambodia, Interpol cautioned us about threats to our lives. We were a group of international filmmakers who had decided to expose an explosive subject matter in a corrupt country. Everything that could go wrong, did - the Cambodian, Vietnamese and Chinese mafia were after us, our equipment was held up in the borders and we were extorted to get it back, we had over forty bodyguards with AK-47s guarding us and the set, we had to hide our film, we got stuck in remote rivers, and finally, after the production team had left, I (Adi) was denied exit out of the country, and basically held hostage for two weeks.

The film, HOLLY, was shot on real locations in which the story takes place. The village in the beginning of the film was an active paedophile haven up to a couple of months prior to the shoot. The brothel rooms are the real brothel rooms and the cafe was used to hosting very different types of clients. It was important for us to be in the real places; it gives this certain energy that is communicated in the film. It was quite a unique set to be on.

HOLLY is such a powerful and unique film. We are proud of it. It was an incredible privilege to work with such a talented group of filmmakers and cast. It is an incredible privilege to create something you feel may make a change. The film (as part of this project) has already led to some change in Cambodia as well other places around the world. Brothels have been closed, children were saved, and traffickers, pimps and clients are in jail.

We encourage the audience to log on to www.RedLightChildren.org and pressure decision makers, governments and global organizations to focus on reducing the demand for child prostitution, through legislature, sanctions, better enforcement of new and existing laws, and the allocation of appropriate resources to mirror the size of the problem.

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HOLLY Premiered on November 7th, 2007 at the UN headquarters in New York City. This was in conjunction with the launch of Glamour Magazine's Woman of the Year, SOMALY MAM's, launch of her foundation in the US.

HOLLY was shot entirely on location in Cambodia, and with very few exceptions shot in REAL places, most notably in the village of Svay Pak (Phnom Penh’s red light district).

The infamous Svay Pak, otherwise known as K11 (for being 11 kilometers from Phnom Penh), was for years the premiere destination of child molesters and sex tourists coming to Cambodia. Both foreigners and locals would come by the thousands to prey on children, some as young as five years old, for a price as low as five U.S. dollars.

This village was fully operative up until 2004, prior to the commencement of principal photography, when it was finally closed down due to international pressure (the girls themselves were simply trafficked to a different area). Both the cast and crew worked under heavy guard to capture the harrowing images of this infamous meat market (still owned by the Vietnamese mafia). The film also features the town of Batambang and a "tour" of all the real brothels it is home to, as well as the actual AFESIP shelter. AFESIP is the region’s leading NGO fighting against the trafficking of women and children. The shooting style is at once choreographed and documentary-style, both in stock choice and its hand held camera approach, attempting to simultaneously convey both immediacy and poetic commentary.

Many of the cast members are non-actor locals. The real languages were kept for authenticity; the film is in Vietnamese, Khmer, and English.

The international cast represents yet another true picture of foreign involvement in Cambodia, where those of good and bad intent arrive from all over the world.