90 Miles From Tyranny

Wednesday, July 12, 2023

The 90 Miles Mystery Box: Episode #2139

You have come across a mystery box. But what is inside?

It could be literally anything from the serene to the horrific,

from the beautiful to the repugnant,

from the mysterious to the familiar.

If you decide to open it, you could be disappointed,

you could be inspired, you could be appalled.

This is not for the faint of heart or the easily offended.

You have been warned.

Visage à trois #1548

Three Videos For Your Viewing Pleasure:

Three Additional Bonus Videos:

Quick Hits Of Wisdom, Knowledge And Snark #1207

Visage à trois #1547

Three Videos For Your Viewing Pleasure:

Three Additional Bonus Videos:

Quick Hits Of Wisdom, Knowledge And Snark #1206

Silencing the ‘Sound of Freedom’

Why is the leftist media targeting a movie about child sex trafficking?

Arguably no issue is less partisan, and more likely to unite people of every political stripe, even in our current state of hyper-polarization, than child trafficking. How could opposition to the cruel kidnapping of children and their forced recruitment into the international sex trade fail to draw unified support from all corners? And yet when a movie comes along that dares to address this uncomfortable topic, this horrific evil, head-on – a movie aimed not only at raising awareness but at inspiring action – the Left curiously rallies to undermine it with partisan smears and ugly innuendo.

Angel Studios’ Sound of Freedom opened last week, a thriller based on the captivating true story of Tim Ballard, a Homeland Security Special Agent frustrated by the lack of effective rescue strategies and prosecutorial authority to help trafficked children in underdeveloped nations. Ballard decided to circumvent the law enforcement bureaucracy to find a more direct, if dangerous, way to undertake the rescue of missing children. In 2013 he founded Operation Underground Railroad (OUR), a U.S.-based nonprofit dedicated to saving children from sex trafficking and sexual exploitation. The organization reportedly has undertaken more than a dozen sting operations. Actor Jim Caveziel brings his passionate intensity to the portrayal of Ballard in the film.

Caveziel, you will remember, is best-known for his astonishing turn as Jesus Christ in the Mel Gibson-directed blockbuster The Passion of the Christ, the movie that opened the eyes of many Hollywood executives who didn’t believe or care that there was a massive audience out there in flyover America hungry for entertainment fare that didn’t trash their faith. Caveziel, openly Christian and conservative in an industry dominated by secular elites, calls Sound of Freedom the most important movie he’s done since Passion.

Now the low-budget film that had been shelved for nearly five years and nearly never saw the light of day has been resurrected and achieved stunning popular success on the Rotten Tomatoes entertainment review site (with a 99% Audience Score) and at the box office.

Just how well is Sound of Freedom doing? John Nolte at Breitbart News writes that “At the close of business Sunday, after only six days in theaters, Sound of Freedom has grossed $40.2 million. Also, over the weekend, it averaged $6,388 per screen, which topped [the latest installment of the Indiana Jones franchise] Dial of Destiny’s per-screen average of $5,760”:

Dial of Destiny might have come in second place with a weekend’s gross box office haul of $26.5 million, and Sound of Freedom might have come in third place with $18.2 million, but Sound of Freedom is doing a better job of packing them in.

Also, Unlike Disney’s Dial of Destiny, which is on track to lose tens if not hundreds of millions, Sound of Freedom is already profitable. Budgeted at just $14.5 million, Sound of Freedom started making millions the moment it crossed $25 to $30 million. And it’s just getting started. With an A+ Cinemascore and the corporate media’s desperate and insulting attacks, word of mouth is all set up to...