Prisoners (2013)
In many respects, Prisoners is the kidnap movie to end all kidnap movies – purely because the nightmare of kidnap runs through every character, and every frame.
Directed by Denis Villeneuve, this Aaron Guzikowski screenplay is set in non-descript surburbia. It sees the Dover family (Hugh Jackman and Maria Bello) attend a Thanksgiving dinner at the home of their friends and neighbours, the Birch family (Viola Davis and Terrence Howard) – during which their children play outside, and the youngest daughters of both families are abducted.
Detective Loki (Jake Gyllenhaal) begins to investigate and the evidence trail leads him directly to Alex Jones (Paul Dano) – a local man whose emotional and intellectual development is delayed. Though Jones is the main suspect, there is not enough evidence to detain him, and after his release, Keller Dover (Jackman) abducts him with the intention of torturing him until he reveals the whereabouts of the two girls.
As the horror relentlessly unfolds, and the families of the two abducted girls become more desperate, Detective Loki begins to piece together a larger kidnap story that has been playing out in the town, unnoticed, for years. With gut-wrenching twists and turns, Jones and the two daughters are not the last characters in the tale to face kidnap and incarceration. Not by a long shot.
