2014 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: Atom Egoyan’s The Captive

Perhaps not as sturdy or as developed as it is with Cannes or TIFF, Atom Egoyan’s relationship with Sundance remains a good one when you double his output of films directed (Next of Kin and Exotica) with films that he exec-produced in The Saddest Music in the World and Away From Her. Formerly going by the title of “Queen of the Night,” The Captive features Ryan Reynolds, Egoyan lucky charm Scott Speedman, Rosario Dawson, Mireille Enos, Kevin Durand, Alexia Fast and the almost always dependable Bruce Greenwood in what should be some welcome genre diversion at the fest and one that will make us forget about the poorly executed Devil’s Knot.

Gist: Written by Egoyan & David Fraser, a pick up truck pulls off the highway at a diner. Confident that his young daughter is safe in the back seat and promising to return with ice cream, the father slips out of his truck and into the diner. When he returns, she is gone. This examines how this kidnapping destroys the relationships among those involved. As the film teases out the complex threads weaving together the victim, her family, the predators and the investigators, the mystery of what happened to the child, during the eight years she was missing, is revealed.

Production Co./Producers: Egoyan, Simone Urdl, Jennifer Weiss, Stephen Traynor.

Prediction: Premieres category is possible. Cannes an outside chance.

U.S. Distributor: Rights Available
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