movie room based on a true story

'Room', directed by Lenny Abrahamson, is an independent moving picture that tells a subtle yet powerful story told from the perspective of five-year-onetime Jack (Jacob Tremblay). His mother, Joy (Brie Larson), was kidnapped and held hostage at the age of seventeen. The movie spans the burdens of victimhood (Joy), the lack of one (Jack), and the struggles of rehabilitation later the trauma of captivity and abuse in a confined space.

Is Room Based on a Truthful Story?

'Room' is based on a book (Room) inspired by the real-life case of Elisabeth Fritzl. Emma Donoghue, the writer of the book said in an interview: "The one line notion of a childhood in a locked room. I got that from the Fritzl case."

The flick shares many parallels with Elisabeth Fritzl and her children, and then much so that it is difficult to dismiss the film as consummate fiction.

Who is Elisabeth Fritzl?

Elisabeth Fritzl was kidnapped and held hostage by her father at the historic period of 18 in the basement of her parents' residence. Josef Fritzl, her father, subjected her to rape and other forms of emotional and physical trauma for 24 years until the case saw lite. During her captivity, she gave birth to 7 children. The pregnancies occurred without medical help. Josef raised three of their children, under the guise that they were abandoned by Elisabeth at his doorstep. His fabricated story was that Elisabeth had run away and joined some cult. The other three children lived with Elisabeth in captivity. Unfortunately, one of her children passed abroad shortly after birth.

When Did People Come to Know?

The whole incident came to calorie-free in Apr 2008, when Elisabeth'due south eldest daughter Kerstin roughshod gravely ill and required immediate medical attending. Josef'due south cooked up story sounded fishy to the medical authorities and as a issue, he was forced to bring Elisabeth to the hospital. At that place, she revealed the horror of the abuse of the past 24 years. At the age of 42, Elisabeth took her first footstep into the outside world along with her children. Birthed and raised in the cellar, her kids were chosen 'Cellar Children'. The atrocity led them to undergo therapy and treatment for years earlier they could slowly immerse themselves into society.

Similarities with Room

Emma Donoghue'due south central inspiration is Felix, Elisabeth's youngest kid who was five years old when the incident came to lite. Jack, who has too simply turned five, is forced to undergo a radical transformation of his unabridged belief organization when he is rushed to the world outside the room. He is simultaneously astonished, scared and curious. He captures the mentality of children who have experienced such captivity. Jack's reaction to open skies, dogs, space and people tugs at one'south centre. What hurts more is that the basis of this stems not from fiction but reality.

The Television in the film is a window to the reality outside. Jack and his mother spend significant time watching TV… then did Elisabeth and her children. It was their only connectedness with the world exterior. Until the escape plan, Ma tells Jack that everything he sees on Tv is not real. Elisabeth had given the same explanation to her children for them to exist more acquainted with their reality. In the volume titled 'Monster', Allan Hall, who has extensively studied 'dungeon abuse' writes:

"Elisabeth procured paper and pens from Fritzl and taught the children to read and write. It is known that the children devoured nursery books and coloring books,… In this extraordinary situation whatsoever female parent would take had a stark choice to make: to tell her children the truth of what happened to her, or make up a story that they could stare in, and so be less curious about the world they had never seen. Elisabeth chose the latter option."

The Room

Another similarity is the space of captivity. In Elisabeth's case, it was the basement at her parents' residence. Josef modified it to get in habitable. The allusion is non lost in 'Room', where the first half of the moving-picture show centers inside the shed where Jack and his female parent were held captives. The room, for the victims, is a world inside a world, defined by what they make of it. Joy makes it a indicate to create a routine for themselves. They cook, read, watch TV, and exercise to pass time. More than chiefly, information technology's Joy'due south way of creating a life for her son within the bars frame.

Apart from these apparent similarities to the case of Elisabeth Fritzl, it is important to encounter how the moving-picture show is a tribute to all victims of 'dungeon abuse'.This includes everything ranging from the trauma of captivity to liberation, inability to cope, and pain. Though based in fiction, the motion picture's roots prevarication in fell reality.

Read More: 25 Best Movies Based on Novels

Source: https://thecinemaholic.com/room-true-story/

Share this post