The return of a kidnapped child should be a happy thing, and in the movies or some TV drama perhaps it is. But the reality is that's only the beginning of the story and the road to recovery for the victim and her parents alike. Nicole Beckwith's directorial debut Stockholm, PA begins as a powerful look at a family whose lives were ripped apart by such a tragedy and the continued pain of reforming that familial bond once it has been severed, but then the film devolves into ugly, useless histrionics that are more laughable than meaningful.
Saoirse Ronan stars as Leia, although her actual name is Leanne. That's what her parents (Cynthia Nixon as Marcy and David Warshovsky as the barely-present father) named her, before she was kidnapped from them 18 years earlier. Now she's suddenly returned, but having lived a life under the "loving" care of her captor (Jason Isaacs), trapped in a basement with no exposure to the outside world, Leanne is basically beginning again from scratch. She has no memory of her life before; all she's ever really known is the life she had in that basement, taught oddly-cultist teachings about the universe and the supposed destruction of humanity.
At first it looks as if Beckwith intends to take a We Need to Talk About Kevin-type look at what happens when the maternal bond is either nonexistent or destroyed. Both women have no idea how to move on beyond the tragedy, and being stuck in the past has left them incapable of coming together. Marcy sees the daughter she loved as a child and treats her as she used to, but Leanne sees her parents as complete strangers. Complicating the matter is that Leanne's abductor was never cruel; he loved her as his own child, and her feelings for him haven't dimmed even as he rots away in prison. She doesn't understand why others think of him as a monster. As the two women fail to connect, a schism forms between Marcy and her husband who doesn't understand why everybody can't just move on. It's not that simple, and Beckwith treats the issue with the nuance it deserves.
But then...it's like a light flips and the whole thing goes skidding over the cliff. Perhaps Beckwith didn't have faith in the material, or didn't know how to resolve it, but soon Marcy becomes increasingly demanding and possessive. Locking Leanne away and basically keeping her captive, her mental state spirals out of control until she becomes kind of a joke. Fed on a strict schedule and kept away from the prying eyes of others, Leanne becomes prisoner to an entirely new captor, but another who claims to do so out of love. There's an ugly cycle being spun and Beckwith's attempts to explore that are lost as the film becomes a complete joke of cornball theatrics and angry tirades, the kind of which you'd see on some bad telefilm. Nixon, looking thin and twitchy and less Miranda than ever, is forced to match the incoherence of the screenplay. For Ronan it's at least the fourth time she's played a character with a limited view of the world (Atonement, Hanna, The Host being the others) and she again taps into that innocence in another great performance.
Stockholm, Pennsylvania deals with complicated subject matter, and while there was no easy path to finding a satisfying resolution it doesn't excuse the crucial mistake in tone Beckwith commits.
Rating: 2.5 out of 5
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