Eden (2012 film)

Eden (Abduction of Eden)
Directed by	Megan Griffiths
Produced by	Colin Harper Plank Jacob Mosler
Screenplay by	Richard B. Phillips Megan Griffiths
Story by	Richard B. Phillips Chong Kim
Starring	Jamie Chung Matt O'Leary Beau Bridges
Music by	Jeramy Koepping Joshua Morrison Matthew Brown
Cinematography	Sean Porter
Edited by	Eric Frith
Production company	Centripetal Films
Distributed by	Phase 4 Films Cinema Management Group (International Sales Agent)
Release dates	March 11, 2012 (2012-03-11) (South by Southwest)
Running time	98 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English

Eden (Abduction of Eden) is a 2012 American dramatic film about human trafficking. It was directed by Megan Griffiths, who co-wrote the screenplay with Richard B. Phillips and stars Jamie Chung, Matt O'Leary and Beau Bridges. The film was produced by Colin Harper Plank and Jacob Mosler through Plank's Centripetal Films production company. It was inspired by the story of Chong Kim, who claims that she was kidnapped and sold into a domestic human trafficking ring in the mid 1990s.^[1][2][3] It had its world premiere at the 2012 South by Southwest Film Festival.^[4]

In 2014, the non-profit organization Breaking Out reported that they had found Kim's story to have no basis in fact and accused her of defrauding organizations out of chartable contributions. In 2009 Kim was convicted of swindling a human trafficking survivor and activist and ordered to pay her $15,000.^[5][6][7][8]

Plot

Hyune Jae is a Korean-American teenager girl living in New Mexico in 1994 with her immigrant parents. Jae works at her father’s taxidermy shop, but is bored. After convincing her reluctant mother to let her go out on a Friday night, she joins her friend Abby at a local bar with fake IDs. Jae meets a good-looking young man in a fireman uniform, and accepts his offer to drive her home. In the car, Jae notices that there is a policeman uniform costume in the backseat and the firefighter badge is fake. Jae attempts to escape from the car, but is caught. She is bound, gagged, and thrown into the trunk of a second car driven by a second man.

Jae is taken to an isolated warehouse in the middle of the desert, where she is put in a hospital room and has her braces and other belongings forcibly removed. Confused and terrified, Jae meets the leader of the operation, a corrupt federal marshal Bob Gault, and his overseer, Vaughan, a short-tempered and drug-addicted striver. After confirming her suspicions that she is now part of a sex-trafficking ring, Gault christens her with her new name, Eden, named after the place where she and her family used to live, and tells her that any acts of trouble could end with the harm of her family. Gault tells her that she has a few days to accept this reality and after that, she will start working for him.

Jae, now Eden, spends the next few days getting to know the horrors of her new life as a forced prostitute. Living with many other underage girls from all parts of the world who are frequently sent out for “dates” with clients, all of the workers are consistently drugged into complacency. First, she is forced to dress in an erotic outfit and star in an adult video. Several days later, Vaughan takes Eden to meet her first customer, where she attempts her first escape by injuring her client and running to a neighboring house for help. Vaughan quickly captures Eden and, after convincing the disgruntled neighbors not to call the police, takes her back to the warehouse where she is punished by being forced to lie in a tub full of ice for several hours. During her time on lockdown, Eden befriends a young, Hispanic girl named Priscilla, who warns her not to let the leaders of the organization know her real age. Before she can learn more, Priscilla is abruptly taken to an unknown destination, and Eden is left alone once again.

A year passes, and at nineteen Eden has slowly begun to understand the inner workings of the sex trade and knows she has little time left before she is no longer useful to the corporation. When she tells Vaughan that he’s being consistently scammed in their gigs, Vaughan realizes Eden’s potential and takes her under his wing. Drawing her out of the “field” of sex work, he gives her an office job answering phone calls from clients and allowing her to join him on trips running errands for the company. A bond forms between the two, with Eden staying with Vaughan even when he brutally murders Gault during a boat trip after the disposal of two bodies, Vaughan eventually takes her to the house of Mario, a man who delivers the babies of some of the sex slaves and sells them for the company’s profit. Recognizing Mario as the man who brought her to the warehouse in the trunk of his car, Eden grows suspicious and explores his house, discovering a pregnant Priscilla who is pleasantly ignorant of the fate of her unborn child. Eden leaves visibly disturbed. Vaughan makes her to prove her loyalty to the organization by forcing her to almost execute one of the sex workers, stopping Eden at the last second.

When Eden and Vaughan return to the warehouse, they are told that one of their men betrayed the company and that they need to relocate. All of the sex workers are packed into vans and their belongings are burned and disposed of, Eden and Vaughan go to a safe house to collect what they need before the trip. Vaughan reveals to Eden that they are moving to Dubai, before leaving her on the couch. Eden decides that she must make her escape. Eden takes Vaughan’s crack pipe from the table and sprays over-the-counter cleaning solution into the tube before placing it in the same spot. When Vaughan returns, he tells her that she doesn’t have the worry about Dubai and that they are “partners”. He takes a hit from his pipe, begins to choke and dies. Eden then cuts her location bracelet from her ankle and drives to Mario’s house, where she tricks him into leading her to Priscilla’s room before injecting him with poison. Running into Priscilla’s room, Eden reveals to Priscilla that her baby was sold and that they have to leave. They drive off into the desert until they reach a pay phone, where Eden calls her mother.

Cast

• Jamie Chung as Eden
• Matt O'Leary as Vaughan
• Beau Bridges as Bob
• Scott Mechlowicz as Jesse
• Tantoo Cardinal as The Nurse

Production

Eden was produced by Centripetal Films and filmed in Washington State in the summer of 2011, with a largely local crew and funding assistance from Washington Filmworks, a government supported non-profit organization that provides financial support for films produced in Washington State. The idea for the film came into being when screenwriter Richard B. Phillips contacted Chong Kim after reading a newspaper article about her account of being sold into and escaping a domestic human trafficking ring. Phillips then proposed the idea of writing a screenplay based on Kim's story. Kim agreed, and the two of them set about writing a story for the film. That story was later turned into a screenplay by Phillips. Plank then hired Megan Griffiths to revise the script, and later hired Griffiths to direct the film.^[3]

Critical reception

Eden has a score of 82% on Rotten Tomatoes based on 33 reviews.^[9] Robert Abele of the Los Angeles Times said the film was "never less than suspenseful, but rather than sentimentally pander to easy outrage, or indulge in icky women-in-distress titillation, the movie...zeros in on the details of how dignity can be stripped like bark from a tree, and the queasy determination it takes to stay alive in a living hell."^[10] Jeff Shannon from Seattle Times awarded the film with 3 out of 4 stars and said that "Cruelty, bloodletting and death are evident throughout (frequently occurring just outside the frame), and Griffith's laudable discretion actually intensifies their impact."^[11] Stephen Holden of the New York Times said that "Enough films about human trafficking have been made in recent years that the outlines of Eden should be painfully familiar. But that familiarity doesn’t cushion this movie’s excruciating vision."^[12] Along with Holden's review Eden was also selected as one of New York Times Critics' Pick.^[12] Stephanie Carrie of the Village Voice said "overall, this is a powerful addition to the small collection of films dedicated to spreading awareness of this horrific crime."^[13]

Many critics particularly praised performance of Jamie Chung. Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian said that "a very strong performance from Chung impresses".^[14] Matthew Turner of ViewLondon said "Chung duly steps up, delivering an emotionally complex performance that requires her to keep her true feelings closely guarded (we also see her distance herself from her work by adopting a different persona)" and ended by saying that it was a "terrific central performance from Jamie Chung".^[15] Stanley Kauffmann of The New Republic wrote "a quite moving performance comes from Jamie Chung as Eden, repulsion sliding into fearful acceptance without the extinction of hope."^[16]

Some reviews were negative. Farran Smith Nehme of the New York Post called it "a Lifetime movie gone upscale-grindhouse" and criticized the South by Southwest festival's decision to give the film an award. Nehme also questioned the film's authenticity.^[17] David Fear of Time Out said the film's second half "head[s] south of ludicrous, [and] Eden’s goodwill dissipates." Fear also questioned the film's authenticity.^[18]

Accusations of fraud

On June 4, 2014 the non-profit anti-trafficking organization Breaking Out announced on their Facebook page that after a year-long investigation of Chong Kim and her life they had "found no truth to her story. In fact, we found a lot of fraud, lies, and most horrifically capitalizing and making money on an issue where so many people are suffering from [sic]." Breaking Out also accused Kim of defrauding several organizations out of charitable donations and announced a coming lawsuit. Later that day Griffiths commented on her Twitter account "I just heard about this today and it came as a shock. I am deeply concerned about it."^[6] Eden's official website claims that "A portion of the net profits from EDEN will benefit anti-slavery organizations."^[19] Kim responded on her Facebook page, stating "I don't appreciate you spreading lies about me … Whatever you claim to have I have the right to see it otherwise I will send you and your organization a formal complaint."^[7]

After these accusations arose, Noah Berlatsky of Salon compared Kim to Somaly Mam and commented that the film was thickly layered with exploitation tropes and improbable scenarios. Berlatsky found it shocking that "anyone took this clearly fanciful, clearly derivative fiction for fact".^[5] Journalist Elizabeth Nolan Brown criticized "the authors who repeated Kim's story, the journalists who interviewed her, the organizations that brought her on as a speaker, or any of the myriad people behind the 'based on a true story' Eden" for not checking and verifying Kim's claims.^[7] Journalist Mike Ludwig argued that the narrative promoted by the film harmed consensual sex workers.^[8] Seattle sex worker Mistress Matisse had been questioning the veracity of the film since 2012.^[6] Matisse stated that Colin Plank and Megan Griffiths "perpetrated a fraud in their movie called Eden." ^[20]

The Stranger journalist David Schmader had previously called the film a masterpiece and the best film ever made in Seattle,^[21] but has since called its back story "bullshit."^[6] Stranger writer Jen Graves was highly critical of Griffith's lack of research into Kim's story and regretted her initial support of the film. Since Breaking Out first made their allegations, Griffiths and others directly associated with the film have refused to comment further,^[20] but the film’s official website continues to promote the film as "Inspired by the harrowing true story of Chong Kim."^[22] In 2012 Griffiths won the Stranger Film Genius Award. Charles Mudede, a Stranger writer and former winner of the award, wrote that Eden had "secured her nomination" and was "a masterpiece".^[23]

On June 25, 2014 Kim’s PR firm Bradshaw & Co. publically denied the allegations and referenced a pending lawsuit.^[24] Since its initial allegation, Breaking Out has continued to release information about Kim on their Facebook page, including court documents detailing Kim’s 2009 felony charge of theft by swindle, for which Kim was ordered to pay $15,000^[20] "to another human trafficking victim and activist in Minnesota."^[25]

Awards and accolades

The film premiered at the 2012 South by Southwest film festival, where it won the Audience Award for Best Narrative Feature, Special Jury Recognition for Best Actress, Jamie Chung, and the award for Emergent Narrative Female Director, Megan Griffiths.^[26]

It also won the Golden Space Needle Award for Best Actress, Jamie Chung and the Lena Sharpe Award for Persistence of Vision; Seattle Reel NW Award at the 2012 Seattle International Film Festival.^[27]

It also won the Audience Award for Best Film at the 2012 San Diego Asian Film Festival^[28]

Release

Eden was released theatrically in North America by Phase 4 Films on March 20, 2013 at Film Forum in New York City.^[29] It also played theatrically in Los Angeles and Seattle, followed by a release on VOD on April 20, 2013. It was released on DVD on June 11, 2013. The DVD and Blu-ray were released in the UK by Queensway Digital Ltd on September 9, 2013.^[30]

A May 2013 screening in Seattle included a panel discussion about human trafficking sponsored by Hope for Justice and the World Affairs Council of Seattle, with panelists including Washington State senator Jeanne Kohl-Welles and YouthCare social worker Leslie Briner. Kohl-Welles had sponsored an anti-sex trafficking bill in the Washington State congress earlier that year^[31] and would be a major supporter of the Motion Picture Competitiveness Bill.^[32] Kohl-Welles and Griffiths were later panelists of the 2014 Seattle Film Summit, which called Kohl-Welles "the most vocal and reliable supporters of the State’s film industry",^[33] and Griffiths spoke at an October 2014 fundraiser in support of Kohl-Welles’s re-election.^[34]

The international distribution rights were licensed by Cinema Management Group.^[35]

See also

• Forbidden Lies
• Human trafficking in popular culture
• Norma Khouri

References

External links

• Official website
• Eden at the Internet Movie Database