Prisoners (2013 film)

In Pennsylvania, the Dover and Birch families celebrate Thanksgiving. That evening, Anna Dover and Joy Birch go missing. Detective Loki responds and arrests Alex Jones. During interrogation, Loki realizes Alex is intellectually disabled and his RV contains no forensic evidence of the missing children. Meanwhile, Alex is released to his aunt Holly. Anna's father Keller Dover assaults Alex outside the police station.

Convinced of his guilt, Keller kidnaps and holds Alex captive in an empty building he owns. A reluctant Franklin Birch, Joy's father, accompanies Keller in interrogating and torturing Alex over the course of several days, who cryptically talks about escaping from a maze.

Loki investigates local sex offender Father Patrick Dunn, where he finds a corpse in a hidden cellar. Dunn, a former priest, reveals he killed the man after he confessed to abducting children. During a vigil for Anna and Joy, Loki chases and fails to apprehend a hooded figure who then burgles the Dover and Birch residences. Suspicious of Alex's disappearance, Loki follows Keller to the empty building but finds nothing. Loki then arrests Bob Taylor, who has been purchasing a plethora of children's clothing. Loki detains Taylor and discovers the walls in his home are covered in maze drawings. He stumbles upon several locked crates filled with snakes and bloody clothing. Taylor confesses to the kidnappings and begins drawing mazes. Loki assaults him, demanding the location of the children. Taylor gains control of another officer's gun and commits suicide.

The Dover and Birch families identify photos of the bloodied clothing as their children's. Keller visits Holly to apologize for assaulting Alex. He learns she and her late husband adopted Alex after their son died of cancer. Meanwhile, Loki discovers a similarity between Taylor's mazes and a necklace belonging to the corpse in Dunn's basement. He realizes that many of the bloody clothes were store-bought and soaked with pigs blood. He also finds Taylor's footprints below a window at the Dover house, along with Anna's sock.

Joy is reunited with her parents, and is hospitalized; the two children were drugged and staged an escape, but Anna was caught. When Keller asks Joy for information, she remembers little, but says she saw him there. Keller realizes she saw him at Holly's house and departs. Loki travels to Keller's building to find him, but instead finds Alex.

Keller arrives at Holly's and she holds him at gunpoint. She informs that her husband's corpse was found in Dunn's basement, revealing they abducted children as part of their "war on God" to avenge their son's death. Alex was their first abduction and Taylor was their second. Holly drugs Keller and imprisons him in a hidden pit in her yard, where he finds his daughter's whistle. Loki arrives at Holly's house to inform her Alex has been found. Seeing a photo of her late husband with the maze necklace, he searches for Holly, who is giving Anna an injection. Loki kills Holly in a shootout, and rushes Anna to the hospital.

Anna and Joy visit Loki in the hospital to thank him. Keller's wife acknowledges that her husband will be arrested if he is found. Later, Loki returns to Holly's house, where he faintly hears Keller blowing the whistle.

Aaron Guzikowski wrote the script based on a short story he wrote, involving "a father whose kid was struck by a hit-and-run driver and then puts this guy in a well in his backyard". That short story was partially inspired by Edgar Allan Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart".[4] After he wrote the spec, many actors and directors entered and exited the project, including actors Christian Bale and Leonardo DiCaprio and directors Antoine Fuqua and Bryan Singer.[4] Ultimately Guzikowski would credit producer Mark Wahlberg for getting the project on its feet, stating, "He was totally pivotal in getting the film made. That endorsement helped it get around."[4] Principal photography began in Georgia in February 2013.[5]

The Prisoners soundtrack, composed by Jóhann Jóhannsson, was released on September 20, 2013.[21]

• The Secret in Their Eyes (2009), an Argentine-Spanish film which includes a theme of suspect kidnapping.
• Secret in Their Eyes (2015), an American remake of The Secret in Their Eyes (2009).

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Prisoners (2013 film).

• Official website
• Prisoners at IMDb
• Prisoners at AllMovie
• Prisoners at Rotten Tomatoes
• Prisoners at Box Office Mojo
• Prisoners at Metacritic