Julia Verdin’s New Social Impact Feature MAYA Has World Premiere at Raindance Film Festival

Julia Verdin’s dark thriller film MAYA has its World Premiere at the Raindance Film Festival on Monday, October 30 at 6:00PM GMT, followed by a Q&A.

Teenager Maya was raised in a household stricken by her father’s abandonment and her mother’s ensuing alcoholism. Maya seeks an escape from her mother’s abusive boyfriend by confiding in a man she meets online, who convinces her to run away. Unbeknownst to Maya, she has been lured into a child trafficking scheme where her confidant quickly becomes her pimp. While Maya fights to understand the difference between love and manipulation, her mother must fight through her addiction in order to bring her daughter home.

WHO:

British filmmaker Julia Verdin is an award-winning multi-hyphenate writer, director, and producer. She has produced dozens of films, including THE MERCHANT OF VENICE, with Al Pacino and Jeremy Irons, and 2 JACKS, with Sienna Miller, Danny Huston, Jack Huston, and Jacqueline Bisset. She is best known for her directorial debut LOST GIRLS (Best Social Impact Film at the Culver City Film Festival) and debut feature ANGIE: LOST GIRLS (Lifetime), both focusing on sex trafficking from the perspective of the victim. Verdin is currently in production on another social impact film, NO ADDRESS, which is about homelessness in America.

Verdin says, “I was inspired to write MAYA after hearing many stories from victims of trafficking about the Stockholm syndrome-type relationships they had with their traffickers. They had been manipulated into believing that their trafficker was the only person who was trustworthy and truly cared for them. To represent these realities of human trafficking in the most authentic way possible, I made sure to meet with anti-trafficking groups and trafficking task force detectives, in addition to survivors. My hope is that MAYA will help educate teenagers and parents as to what trafficking looks like—when people join their voices on an issue, change is possible!”

WHEN:

Monday, October 30 at 6:00PM GMT