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''Nefarious: Merchant of Souls'' is a 2011 American documentary film about modern human trafficking, specifically sexual slavery. Presented from a Christian worldview, ''Nefarious'' covers human trafficking in the United States, Western and Eastern Europe, and Southeast Asia, alternating interviews with re-enactments. Victims of trafficking talk about having been the objects of physical abuse and attempted murder. Several former prostitutes talk about their conversion to Christianity, escape from sexual oppression, and subsequent education or marriage. The film ends with the assertion that only Jesus can completely heal people from the horrors of sexual slavery. ''Nefarious'' was written, directed, produced and narrated by Benjamin Nolot, founder and president of Exodus Cry, the film's distributor. Nolot, who travelled to 19 countries to collect the film's content, said that the purpose of the film is "to draw people's attention to the issue, but also to inspire them in terms of what they can be doing … to take a stand against this injustice."〔 The film was officially released on July 27, 2011, with individual grassroots screenings also taking place. Laila Mickelwait, Exodus Cry's director of awareness and prevention, screened the film in several countries in an attempt to persuade governments to make laws similar to Sweden's ''Sex Purchase Act'', which criminalizes the purchasing rather than the selling of sex. The film was released on home video on May 1, 2012. Interviewees in the film include Canadian journalist Victor Malarek, Jerusalem Institute of Justice founder Calev Myers, Christian therapist Dan Allender, clinical psychologist Melissa Farley, Piet Keesman, Baptist missionary Lauran Bethell, Agape International Missions founder Don Brewster, anti-trafficking activist Helen Sworn, former prostitute Annie Lobert, and Swedish detective superintendent Kajsa Wahlberg. Ted Baehr of ''Movieguide'', a Christian magazine, called the film "a powerful, compelling and transformational documentary about human trafficking and sex slavery" and commented that it covered the inherently sexual subject matter candidly without displaying nudity.〔 Dan Preston of ''Godculture Magazine'' praised Nolot's writing and directing. ''Nefarious'' has won film awards, including the Honolulu Film Award for best screenplay, the Urban Mediamakers Film Festival best documentary feature award, and the Indie Fest feature documentary award of excellence. ==Themes== ''Nefarious: Merchant of Souls'' documents modern human trafficking, specifically sexual slavery. While there are men and boys who are trafficked around the world, the United States Department of State (DoS) estimates that about 80% of human trafficking victims are female, and the film focuses on them.〔 Information is presented from a Christian worldview—despite the subject matter, there is no profanity or nudity in the film, although there are scenes showing alcohol consumption and women wearing skimpy clothing.〔 ''Nefarious'' explores how sex trafficking differs from country to country, and suggests that all the victims are both psychologically and emotionally enslaved.〔 One of the initial assertions in the film is that slavery has not been abolished but is increasing, and that half of this slavery is sexual in nature.〔 ''Nefarious'' identifies political corruption and difficult socioeconomic situations as elements that prevent sex slaves from escaping exploitation, and suggests that most victims do not survive for more than seven years after initially being trafficked. While the violent acquisition of sex slaves depicted in the first sequence of the film does occur in reality, Jimmy Stewart of ''Charisma'' wrote that most girls who are sexually trafficked in Europe are recruited through a fraudulent offer of employment and an improved lifestyle overseas, neither of which ultimately materializes in the new country. ''Nefarious'' asserts that there is a link between the international sex industry and legal prostitution in the Western world,〔 and that those who create the demand for forced prostitution around the world are of a wide variety of ages and are often considered respectable. The film contrasts the secretiveness and brutality of the sex industry in Eastern Europe with the openness of public prostitution in the Netherlands. ''Nefarious'' suggests that sex trafficking in Southeast Asia is fuelled largely by the complicity of the victims' parents,〔 with many in Cambodia grooming and then knowingly selling their daughters into prostitution to pay for luxury goods.〔 The film asserts that 10% of the population of Moldova has been sexually trafficked.〔 ''Nefarious'' contrasts Las Vegas prostitutes with victims of sex trafficking in Europe, depicting the former as drawn into the sex industry by dreams of a glamorous lifestyle, and the latter as made vulnerable by child abandonment and orphanages.〔 The film presents human trafficking statistics and assertions from a variety of sources, prominently departments of the United States government and the United Nations. These include that human trafficking is growing faster than any other criminal industry, that the average age of those forced into prostitution in the U.S. is 13, that the commercial sexual exploitation of children victimizes almost two million children globally, that 80% of trafficked women and 50% of trafficked children are sexually exploited, that 161 UN member states engage in human trafficking, and that modern slavery has an annual revenue of —according to the film, higher than the annual revenues of Major League Baseball, the National Basketball Association, the National Football League and the National Hockey League combined.〔 The film indicates that "trafficking is an exploitation of vulnerability" and expresses the need to "take away the stigma that () choose to be there."〔 Kevin Bales of Free the Slaves is quoted as saying that there are 27 million slaves in the world. The film ends with the assertion that only Jesus can free people from sexual slavery.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Nefarious: Merchant of Souls」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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