Abducted in Plain Sight (2017)

“Jan Broberg and Robert Berchtold had an unnatural relationship.” – Pete Welsh

Number of Times Seen – 1 (7 Mar 2019)

Brief Synopsis – Documentary about the way a man stalked and abducted a young girl after becoming close to her family via deception and lies.

My Take on it – This is a film that I had never heard of before my good friend Allie of Often Off Topic brought this film to my attention.

She warned me that I would be shocked by all that transpires here and she was very right in her assessment of the situation.

(HUGE thanks for the recommendation Allie!)

I’m actually quite glad that I knew almost absolutely nothing about this story before seeing this movie because it helped keep things as surprising as possible along the way.

The story is extremely fascinating to watch unfold and it gets scarier and scarier as we see how easy it apparently was for these events to transpire.

They do an excellent job showing how a man could be so deceptive and through his facade was able to gain so much trust and affection from the very people that he targeted to cause so much pain and anguish towards.

The repercussions of the events in this film are still felt nearly 50 years later.

One might assume that much of this story is silly because it makes us question how gullible people can truly be, but the fact that we have the advantage of hindsight causes the viewer to forget that things need to be viewed from the eyes of the people as these things are happening which proves how innocent they were at the time.

This innocence actually opened the door for someone with a vile plan to cause so much suffering for them that will probably never be able to go away.

Looking at things 50 years on, it’s easy to see the whole plan and its deception, but we cannot judge these people for not realizing the danger they were getting themselves into.

This story stays very interesting, intriguing and engaging throughout and that is helped by the fact that the story itself has lots of twists and turns along the way that go places that one would never expect.

Bottom Line – Fascinating film that is quite scary because of the things that it shows. It’s amazing to see how someone can be so deceptive and be taken in as such a trustworthy friend and use that to cause so much pain and suffering for decades due to his actions. Some of the story sounds so silly because it’s easy in hindsight for the viewer to have trouble believing the innocence and gullibility that is seen here, but it’s quite hard to judge the way the events transpired.  They manage to keep this story engaging and intriguing throughout because it goes in directions that one would never expect.  Highly Recommended!

MovieRob’s Favorite Trivia – Won 14 of 15 nominations for Best Documentary at nationwide film festivals. (From IMDB)

Rating – Oscar Worthy (9/10)

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