I liked the concept of the movie, which involved an 11 year old boy who was kidnapped from his parents when he was three by a couple who raised him as their son, and the boy running away to find his real parents after finding out that he was kidnapped. The previous person to write a comment on this film asked if there is a biography on this boy. This work is fiction as far as I believe, but I am also wondering if it is based on an actual case. If not a "true story", I am assuming this film was loosely inspired by the case of other kidnapped children who returned to their parents, especially Steven Stayner. He was the kid who was kidnapped at seven years of age in 1972 and made it back to his parents after living with his captor for seven years; and the TV film about that case (I Know My First name is Steven) was made one year before this film.
I liked this film except for the parts with the characters getting murdered, attempting to murder, or killing themselves (the death of the kidnapper's other son not being an accident, Meredith Baxter's character shooting her husband, her trying to kill Billy/Tommy when he goes to his real mother, and her killing herself at the end of the film). These scenes I feel take away from the human story of this film and make is less real and more like a generic TV thriller. I believe that with such a story about a boy trying to return to his real parents it should be told more as a drama rather than as a thriller that's more scary than realistic. Also, I would have rather had the home where Billy's real mother lives be less grim (i.e. more spacious and the mother being married). If he went to live with his real mother, they should have had him move in with both his mother and his father and to a home not looking more grim than the one he moved out of.
I liked this film except for the parts with the characters getting murdered, attempting to murder, or killing themselves (the death of the kidnapper's other son not being an accident, Meredith Baxter's character shooting her husband, her trying to kill Billy/Tommy when he goes to his real mother, and her killing herself at the end of the film). These scenes I feel take away from the human story of this film and make is less real and more like a generic TV thriller. I believe that with such a story about a boy trying to return to his real parents it should be told more as a drama rather than as a thriller that's more scary than realistic. Also, I would have rather had the home where Billy's real mother lives be less grim (i.e. more spacious and the mother being married). If he went to live with his real mother, they should have had him move in with both his mother and his father and to a home not looking more grim than the one he moved out of.
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