History of the film
Skin Trade is a 2014 action thriller film directed by Ekachai Uekrongtham, and starring Dolph Lundgren, Tony Jaa, Michael Jai White, and Ron Perlman. Lundgren wrote the film with Gabriel Dowrick and Steven Elder, while John Hyams performed uncredited script revisions. The film centers around New Jersey police detective Nick Cassidy, as he travels to Asia intent on killing the man who murdered his family, mobster Viktor Dragovic. He is also set on destroying Dragovic's human trafficking network.
Development started in 2007 after Lundgren read a news report about a group of girls being smuggled into the United States from Mexico. The girls were left in a vehicle along the border, and trapped inside, they all died of heat stroke and suffocation. Skin Trade had a $9 million production budget, and was shot over 50 days in Canada and Thailand. It was the first film to be shot in English by an organization based in Asia (outside of Hong Kong) for an international theatrical release.
The film premiered at the American Film Market on November 7, 2014. This was followed by a limited theatrical release, starting on April 9, 2015 in the United Arab Emirates, and succeeded by Thailand (on April 23), Malaysia (on April 30), and the United States (on May 8). The film grossed $384 thousand at the worldwide box office, but it received mostly negative reviews. Particular criticism was aimed at Jaa's fluency in English, as well as at the film's scant focus on human trafficking.
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