3096 Days

A German film adapted from Natascha Kampusch's account. Kampusch was taken on her way to school in Vienna in 1998, aged ten, and held in Wolfgang Priklopil's house for more than eight years; the number in the title is the count of days. The first version of the script was Bernd Eichinger's and it was his last work; after his sudden death Ruth Toma and Martin Moszkowicz finished it. Sherry Hormann directed. The film stays close to Kampusch's book and insists on one thing in particular: captivity produces dependence, not only violence. Once the man holding her is the sole source of food, light, speech and time, adapting to him becomes the method of staying alive. Antonia Campbell-Hughes plays Kampusch and Thure Lindhardt plays Priklopil. Campbell-Hughes lost a great deal of weight for the part, which became its own argument around the release. Kampusch was not involved in the production but approved the adaptation. Who it is for: viewers who can carry heavy drama drawn from a real case. Who it is not for: almost anyone. It contains child abuse and sustained violence, and the criticism that it turns a real victim's experience into spectacle stuck to it, not unfairly.