There is little one can do to prepare for the unknown.
Like a lot of people, I was taken aback by the sudden death of actress Natasha Richardson. For a day or so there I was surprised by all the coverage her skiing accident was getting, but then it became clear that it was more serious than a simple accident and then the word came down last night that she had died. Over the years I've only managed to see a few of her films (Gothic, The Handmaid's Tale, The Favour, the Watch and the Very Large Fish), but I've actually had one -- 1988's Patty Hearst, in which she starred as the kidnapped heiress -- on tape for about a month, so I figured there was no time like the present. Directed by Paul Schrader and based on the book Hearst wrote about her experiences, the film follows her from the day in February 1974 when she was abducted by the Symbionese Liberation Army from her home in Berkeley, California, through her capture by federal agents a year and a half later and the subsequent trial and media circus.
Since the film is told almost entirely from Hearst's point of view, Richardson has to work overtime to convey her changing states of mind as she first endures her time as a hostage, then becomes indoctrinated by the members of the SLA holding her, and finally joins the group in earnest, taking part in a bank robbery and passing up numerous opportunities when she could have conceivably walked away a free woman. It's during this time that we actually get to know some of the other members of the organization, including self-styled field marshal Ving Rhames, their tactical and ideological leader, blustering loudmouth William Forsythe (who desperately wants to be black) and his barely tolerant wife (although that means little within the ranks of the group) Frances Fisher. As it turns out, Hearst isn't the only one who's been brainwashed: they've also done a number on themselves since all of them are operating under the delusion that the people are with them when in actual fact the people they encounter are just scared shitless. (If somebody waved a gun in your face and said they had to "borrow" your car in the name of the SLA, what would you do?)
I have to confess I didn't know a whole lot about Hearst's life before I watched this movie. I knew the broad strokes of what she had gone through (thanks to a brief explanation my mother once gave me about the Hall & Oates song "Rich Girl"), but was hazy on the particulars. As a matter of fact, I know Hearst more from her later work with director John Waters in films like Cry-Baby, Serial Mom and A Dirty Shame, which of course came after this film was released. As for the pardon she sought for so many years, she had to wait until Bill Clinton left office in 2001 for it to be granted. Still, I'm sure that must have been a load off her mind.