A dramatization of sex-trafficking networks in Mexico and the United States, Trade occasionally uses exploitation to get you worked up about, well, exploitation. The film stumbles whenever it tries to frame its topic within a conventional narrative – that’s when contrivance, manipulation and sentimentality slip in and seem even more out of place than they would in a less tragic picture. A somber, nearly somnambulate Kevin Kline stars as a Texas cop named Ray. Ray comes across a 17-year-old Mexican boy (Cesar Ramos) who has illegally crossed the border to rescue his younger, kidnapped sister (a devastating Paulina Gaitan). Together, they form an awkward investigative team trying to negotiate the awful world of stash houses and sex-slave auctions. Perhaps Trade would have worked better as a journalistic, Traffic-style depiction of the illegal sex industry. As it stands – with comic-relief banter between Kline and Ramos and a thematically convenient back story for Kline’s character – the movie stirs up more frustration than outrage.
