Cleveland Abduction

2015 "Based on a true story."
6.6| 1h28m| NA| en| More Info
Released: 02 May 2015 Released
Producted By: Lifetime
Country: United States of America
Budget: 0
Revenue: 0
Official Website:
Info

A single mother becomes Ariel Castro's first kidnapping victim, and finds herself trapped in his home with two other women for 11 years.

Genre

Drama, Crime, TV Movie

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Cleveland Abduction (2015) is currently not available on any services.

Director

Alex Kalymnios

Production Companies

Lifetime

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Cleveland Abduction Audience Reviews

Evengyny Thanks for the memories!
Sexyloutak Absolutely the worst movie.
Megamind To all those who have watched it: I hope you enjoyed it as much as I do.
Hattie I didn’t really have many expectations going into the movie (good or bad), but I actually really enjoyed it. I really liked the characters and the banter between them.
rbrb This drama is apparently based on true events and I have no idea how accurate is the depiction in the film. But that said this movie is both compelling and heart wrenching.A young woman is kidnapped by a lunatic and kept prisoner and tortured as are other young females. The brutal treatment of the victims is appalling. Both lead players give first rate performances as do the other performers though there are times in this picture I needed to look away due to the horrid nature of events.Sometimes I really feel ashamed that men can be so wicked to females..Despite the sordid content in this movie, its' realism gains it a vote of:8/10.
quincytheodore Cleveland Abduction is very identical to case documentary or event reenactment, and it's highly effective. It doesn't present too much glossy cinematography to make it as authentic as possible, though still with enough restriction for the delicate subject. Acting from Taryn Manning and Raymond Cruz, the captor and captive, are brazenly intimidating to highlight the gruesome struggle.It follows the event of actual kidnapping where a man, Ariel Castro (Raymond Cruz) abducts three women for eleven years. The movie depicts this horrendous act with superior acting and true to life visual. It occasionally looks devoid of color, grainy and dirty, while some of the outdoor scenery seems refreshing with cool ambiance. This presents the urban location in accurate perspective along with its darker shade.Much of its better moments are from the good performance by the actors. It has surprisingly tender and sorrowful moments, all of which look genuine. This is not a well-orchestrated crime, yet it's incredibly shocking that the real person can maintain the act for so long. Raymond Cruz is a good cast for the role, he's often sickeningly brutal and easily becomes the fitting antagonist.However, it does have some flaws. Several of the scenes try to depict the abuse, but they might feel heavy-handed in the approach. The camera is sometimes out of focus, it's probably intentional to induce realism, though it's a bit comfortable at times. The pace tends to screech a bit towards the second half despite the good intention of showing the aftermath or restrain for more gory moments. These don't take away the venerable effort to convey its message though.Keeping the story grounded, it manages to tell the abusive story and its ramification with equal poise and intimate outlook.
Spotif Eyeball (spotifeyeball) Vapid, bland acting on the part of the lead who plays Michelle Knight, does not look like her, act like her, talk like her, I cannot understand why this untalented woman was cast as this part. She showed the least emotion of the three female actresses and I was wincing more for how bad her acting was than how horribly Michelle Knight was treated. I read Michelle's book and have studied this case and watched her interviews, this lead was horribly miscast. The male lead was not much better, he was way too good-looking to be that demon-man monster, he was too nice and not psychopathic enough at all. It was way too much of a story to cram into 90 minutes, I am not sure any movie or documentary or book will ever do justice to what happened to these girls and the daughter produced in captivity. The actresses who played Gina and Amanda were far better cast and were credible actors. As far as the storyline, it was superficial and glossed over so many important issues, like how the police ignored this man-- a man who had beaten his common-law wife to a pulp years before kidnapping these girls, how the police came to the home when there were reports of screams and noises and did not attempt to enter; how somehow this man was not considered a suspect in the circle of at least Gina's world when he had a violent history and knew her by way of his own daughter. I am stunned the police were this blind, how this man was literally hiding in plain sight for so long. My best wishes for these four victims in that home is that that their futures are filled with every good thing that they would like from now on, that they will find love and appreciation and healing and fulfillment. But if you do not know the story do not rely on this cheeseball Lifetime show. Read Michelle's book, read Amanda and Gina's book, watch their interviews. This was a waste of time and did not do them justice in any way. Someone out there make a better movie than this about what happened for 11 years in Cleveland!
Ed-Shullivan This drama is based on actual events that occurred over a period of more than ten (10) years. The actual perpetrator Ariel Castro was 42 when he first abducted Michelle Knight on August 21, 2002. Michelle was in the process of trying to regain custody of her son from the state when she was abducted. Michelle had agreed to get in to Ariel Castro's truck as she knew Ariel's daughter so she failed to see any danger in getting in to Ariel's truck at that time.Subsequent to Michelle Knight's kidnapping Ariel then kidnapped Amanda Berry on April 21, 2003 and Gina DeJesus on April 02, 2004. The film focuses mainly on the relationship between the dominant kidnapper Ariel Castro (played by Raymond Cruz) and his first victim Michelle Knight (played by Taryn Manning). The film does more than an adequate job in the 90 minutes made available to capture the imprisonment of the three young girls and how Ariel Castro first physically and then mentally subjected his kidnapping victims to torture to the point that they knew if they even attempted to escape they would receive a beating.Fortunately for the films viewers we were spared any vivid graphic violence and rape of the three girls. Actor Raymond Cruz recently starred in the multi Emmy winning series Breaking Bad as drug kingpin Tuco Salamanca. For those of you who have watched Breaking Bad you will be familiar with Tuco's violent and crazy side so when I first heard that Raymond Cruz was playing the role of the vile Ariel Castro I was a bit concerned that the film may include some gratuitous violence as it was in Raymond Cruz's capacity as an actor to emulate this scum of the earth kidnapper Ariel Castro. Fortunately the director Alex Kalymnios chose to maintain a factual film theme and limit the depiction of the hundreds of rapes and beatings that Ariel Castro subjected his victims to.This 90 minute film also does a good job of encapsulating the friendship and feeling of family the three girls shared which most likely made it a bit more bearable under the circumstances of being chained, beaten and repeatedly raped. As in the actual events we get to see how Amanda Berry gave birth to Ariel Castro's daughter with the assistance of Michelle Knight who was threatened with death if she did not succeed in ensuring Amanda's baby lived.It is sad to realize that Castro's first victim, Michelle Knight was considered a runaway and very little was done to look for her as she was 21 years old at the time of her abduction. The press and police had communicated publicly that she most likely chose on her own accord to disappear as she had lost custody of her son to the state. Taryn Manning who played Michelle Knight made the audience feel how a kidnapped victim may have despaired as the years progressed and the abuse continued. In fact the film also depicts how Ariel Castro beat Michelle up when he felt she was pregnant with his child and so he ensured Michelle would abort the fetus by hitting her in the stomach with a barbell and kicking her in the stomach.This is both a film about hopelessness, family by circumstances, and the evil of men with no conscience. Castro was arrested on May 06, 2013, more than 10 years and 8 months since he first abducted Michelle Knight. As mentioned earlier the films run time was only approximately 90 minutes and maybe the producers could have provided more in depth of the psyche of both the perpetrator Ariel Castro and the victims at the time of their abduction who were Michelle Knight (21), Amanda Berry (she turned 17 the day after her abduction) and the youngest and last of his victims Gina Dejesus (14) had the film been produced as a 4 or 6 hour mini-series.I felt the producers did a very good job in providing the facts of this 11 year case history. Remember when Castro was arrested on May 06, 2013, CNN news carried the story almost exclusively for the next two weeks, 24 hours a day. No one could believe that not one but "THREE" young girls who were missing and presumed dead for years were being held prisoners less than 3 miles from their own homes. By the end of the film it leaves us with the question if Ariel Castro deliberately wanted to get caught and so he neglected to lock the front door because he was behind on his mortgage payments, could not afford to feed his 3 captors and his child, and after close to eleven years of maintaining a prison in his home he had just had enough of the lies, beatings and rapes that he had been responsible for.This is a tragic but true story that covers a lot of abuse and actual events that the kidnapper Ariel Castro was able to hide from his own children, his band mates who actually practiced as a band in his home, and his two brothers who were initially also arrested under the assumption that they had to have known about the kidnappings and 10 year imprisonment when in fact Ariel was able to keep everyone fooled including his own family by keeping locks on the basement door as well as the upstairs bedrooms and by sealed windows.I hope the victims benefit financially from this film and if so I recommend the film to parents and children alike to ensure one of the films messages is clear. That message being if you are getting in to someone's vehicle make sure your family knows where you are going and with whom you are going. I give this true story a 7 out of 10 rating.