SOLD in Select Theaters Now
Posted at 2:03 PM (PDT) on Saturday, April 16, 2016

This New Film Exposes the Heartbreaking Reality of Sex Slavery and 'Debt Bondage' Around the World
By Kate Dwyer
Teen Vogue: April 15, 2016

Adapted from the internationally bestselling novel by Patricia McCormick, SOLD follows a 13-year-old Nepali girl named Lakshmi whose father sends her to Kolkata, India, to work as a domestic servant. Instead, she finds herself living as a sex slave in a prison brothel known as "Happiness House," forced to work in exchange for the advance paid to her parents. This practice is known as "debt bondage," and it's all too common across the world, especially in developing regions.

[Snipped]

TV: The film is being cut down to a 50-minute version to be released in schools. Why do you think it's so important for young people to educate themselves about this issue?

GA: Young people right now are activists to a degree that we have never seen before in history. We need to be creating a generation of abolitionists who say, "We will not stand for slavery. We will not stand for human rights atrocities. We are not going to let this happen in our generation." When we were at the U.N. [at the end of March], it occurred to me that I've come through a career now where because of a character I played early on who was a very strong, intelligent, outspoken young woman. I have an army of young fans behind me who have sometimes followed the charities that I work on today, which has been wonderful. One common thread is that those girls get to choose how they want their future to look: the schools, the education they want to receive, what it is they want to be when they grow up.

One way or another, whether they come from poor families or wealthy families, there is still a degree of choice there. But the youngsters we are talking about have no voice and no choice whatsoever, and they need the younger generation in the West and around the world to speak up for them and to start calling for an end. We are the gatekeepers of their freedom, and it's really, really important that we take on that responsibility and accept that role. We have the power to make change, and we can be that voice for them when they don't have it themselves.

SOLD opened with in limited release April 1, and will be released nationwide throughout the next month. To join the Taught Not Trafficked campaign, text SOLD to 51555.

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