Amazing Grace - The Movie

In my meanderings through the web, I came across an article about a movie called Amazing Grace that is coming out in February about the life of William Wilberforce, a key player in the abolition of slavery in Britain in 1807 (the 200 year anniversary is on March 25). I don't know how well publicized it has been in the States, but this is the first time I've heard of it, and I thought I'd post the trailer here. It looks like it could be interesting. I really appreciate that the owner of the production company behind the film (Bristol Bay Productions) seems to have a motive beyond entertainment (and profit) and has started a campaign called 'Amazing Change' to draw attention to the persistence of slavery worldwide today.

"It's hard to imagine, but there are more people living in slavery than at other times in history," the company said in a press statement, noting that an estimated 27 million people could be described as slaves today....

Today, slavery is less visible and less institutionalized than in the past, but, as the London-based lobby Anti-Slavery International never ceases to point out, it still exists in parts of South America, Africa and China as well in some European cities where prostitutes from Africa and Eastern Europe are trapped in forced unpaid labor.

So is it just imaginative movie marketing to link "Amazing Grace" to the campaign against modern slavery? Well, it is a cause that certainly needs help. And to those sniffing at the production company's "Amazing Change" campaign, Knight offered a sharp retort: "I hope that cynics who watch the film will recognize their fellow cynics."

Read Amazing Grace in the Life of William Wilberforce by John Piper (e-book in pdf format)