The Captive

Naturally, I was intrigued by "The Captive", great plot and amazing actors, what could possibly go wrong? From the start, I could tell this movie was going to have a ton of flashbacks, which is fine, until those flashbacks kinda become irrelevant because the viewer has no idea which flashback comes first. Strike 1. The introduction of Scott Speedman was a treat, until he was a bit weird acting and since that was never explained, I guess that was just his character?.. Then the part where Ryan Reynolds character has an abusive past was brought up (in reference to plot), then was never to be heard of again. Strike 2. Still don't know much about the wife's character. Strike 3. No explanation about the relationship of the two detectives (Dawson & Speedman) but since Dawson seemed to have a picture of Speedman's niece in her office, it's to be assumed they're in a relationship. OK. And for the focus to be the family of the missing girl, I feel it rarely focused on them. Strike 4.

This movie just needed a lot of tweaking. Starting with some back story of the characters at the beginning. And less flashbacks. More explanations. And more focus on how the unit was actually working towards finding the missing child.

This movie has a good concept and the initial ground work is there. Problem is they jump from past to future without the viewer realizing it in many instances so it gets confusing trying to keep the story line straight (all they needed to do was add a year or something to the bottom corner of the screen). A few scenes do not make sense leading up to the finish of the movie as it is confusing if your are watching past or current events unfolding. Ryan Reynolds basically made this a decent movie with his acting skills, the rest of the cast are kind of annoying to watch. All said, what really made me positive I would never watch this again is that it just goes from being at a pinnacle point that they could have built up a huge amount of suspense and finished with a bang to a quick non suspenseful ending that just closed a few loose ends and ended the movie.

Plain and simple, this movie is so ridiculous it's almost funny. I feel like it was written by teenagers. The story line has potential but the way it is told is confusing, unclear, and with no real purpose for being so out of order.. With the exception of the father played by Ryan Reynolds, I have to say that every single character is extremely unrealistic. The detectives in particular are the most unbelievable characters I've ever seen in a movie to date. They acted childish and inexperienced, not at all like the child abduction detectives they are meant to be. The most ridiculous thing for me was the treatment of Ryan Reynolds' character (as the father of the missing girl). Yes, I get that often the parents are the first suspects in a child abduction case.. But once they are ruled out, that should be the end of it! Their treatment of the father in the initial interview is absolutely absurd... And yet, even 8 years after the abduction, when it is pretty bloody obvious the father had nothing to do with the abduction, Scott Speedman's character is still giving the poor guy a hard time about it! For e.g, Speedman's detective finds it suspicious that Reynolds has a shrine to his missing daughter in the back of his truck? I believe the exact quote was "what's with the shrine, man?" as he is taking photos of the truck... On what planet is it suspicious behaviour to have a shrine of your missing daughter?! It would be more suspicious if Reynolds' character wasn't grieving over his missing daughter, wouldn't it?? The character of the kidnapper is also just absolutely hilarious. His voice, his demeanor, his facial expressions, all just completely over the top. I half expected him to swivel around in an arm chair stroking a cat with a patch over his eye.. Argh. Don't waste your time with this piece of poop.

Once again the actual ratings on IMDb are not correct at all to me. This movie deserves a lot more then a 5.8 rating. If it was not for the ending that wasn't that great I would have give it an eight. But for the rest I was really entertained by The Captive. The story is well written and keeps you interested during the whole movie. I'm not a huge fan of movies where the story goes back and forth from past to present but in this one it didn't really bothered me. The cast was well chosen and they all gave us a good performance, especially Mireille Enos. Ryan Reynolds a bit lesser but it was okay. I really felt the disgust for pedophiles through the whole movie. Disgusting predators that should be locked up for life. The movie gives you a good view about their disturbed minds and their complete absence of feelings for their victims. A good movie to watch, don't trust the ratings on here.

It's an interesting film with many good character studies but so confusing because of its jumping all over the place timeline. Very difficult to keep track of what's going on.