MELBOURNE -- A hard-hitting thriller about the exploitation of Asian sex slaves in Australia has won critical acclaim and revived the career of its creator, a one-time Disney director who has pursued her own doggedly independent path since undergoing a sex-change operation.

"The Jammed" shines a spotlight on a seedy Melbourne underworld where gangsters force young women, mainly from Southeast Asia, to work in brothels and keep them locked up when not servicing clients.

The film has been hailed by critics as the best Australian thriller for years, with The Age newspaper describing it as "a shock of electricity that restores one's faith in just how good Australian social-realist films can be."

It has also been adopted by welfare groups as a way to focus the attention of politicians in Canberra on the issue of sex slavery and was screened in Vienna last month at a UN conference on human trafficking.