Special Jet Centre movie preview of Marmaduke in aid of

"I first heard about StandOut International from Barbara Campbell, our business development manager, who'd been doing some fundraising through her local church for the charity," Michael told the Times.

"Barbara can be very persuasive and when she told me about the nature of the abuse that children, toddlers and even babies are being subjected to, I felt I had to do something."

Michael approached the local team at 20th Century Fox, the distributors behind the fantastic new family film, Marmaduke and they immediately pledged their support by facilitating a charity preview screening of the movie, which follows the comic adventures of an accident-prone Great Dane.

It's estimated that two youngsters are trafficked for sex every minute of every day somewhere in the world. And the extent of the problem faced in Cambodia is vast. It's believed that more than 820,000 people are trafficked for sex across the world every year - 80 per cent are female, almost 50 per cent are children and around 100,000 of them live in Cambodia.

A wide variety of child sex exploitation exists - everything from sex tourism and pornography to prostitution, child marriages and sexual assault - and the average price of a child is currently around 100.

"Once you know the kind of figures involved, it's hard to get them out of your head," said Barbara Campbell.

"I'd spend that shopping for the family in Tesco, and every week I'd think, that money could pay to get another child to safety."

StandOut International is a Northern Irish-based, non-profit organisation that builds on the platform of Christian worship in order to educate the public about the reality of child sex exploitation while, at the same time, supporting the Christian charity Viva on the ground as it works to release kids from the sex trade, provide them with medical care, educate them and find them safe homes.

It was a realisation of the scale of the problem faced and a determination to make a practical difference that brought Movie House on board, and now, thanks to the generosity of film distributors 20th Century Fox vital funds will be raised for StandOut's efforts in Cambodia.

On August 14, Movie House Cinema at the Jet Centre in Coleraine will be the venue for a charity preview screening of Marmaduke. Tickets for this event are on sale now, priced at 5 each or a family ticket at 15.

The tickets can be bought from the Movie House cinema in Coleraine or by contacting [email protected]

Doors open 10am with the movie showing at 10.30am. Every penny of this effort will be donated to StandOut International.

Barbara added: "This is about having fun and it's about raising money for an incredibly worthy cause, but it's also about taking a stand, it's about helping to free these youngsters from terrible servitude.

"I would appeal to everyone, to come and support this event and please help us make a difference in the lives of these kids."