Abducted In Plain Sight
Did you watch this?
Documentaries have flourished in the Netflix era. And I must say, I love a good one, since truth is stranger than fiction, and ultimately more believable. (I know that sounds obvious, but we read fiction for the truth embodied therein. But when you encounter the unvarnished truth it takes you aback, and makes you question all your preconceptions. THIS REALLY HAPPENED? And the funny thing is non-fiction so rarely contains truth, essence, the nuggets.)
Anyway, this film was made in 2017. Why did it not get distribution for years?
Kinda like Malcolm Gladwell says in “Outliers,” timing is key.
But I feel like I just spent ninety minutes on weekend CNBC/MSNBC or “20/20,” where they have these true crime specials with heavy music that you watch once and then never tune in again.
But “Abducted In Plain Sight” is different because it happened TWICE?
I know, I know, you could consider that a spoiler, but it was in all the reviews.
Bottom line, there’s a manipulative child molester and…
Forget that the kid is susceptible, so are the parents!
You’re watching this flick and wondering what they were thinking. Kinda like you go to a horror movie and yell out to the soon to be dead to WATCH OUT!
But we don’t expect people to be so evil.
And… Does the fact that they’re LDS and live in Pocatello make a difference?
I’ve been to Pocatello. In today’s cheap flight era, where you go to the destination and don’t waste any time driving in between, most people have not. But there’s a vast swath of the west that is relatively uninhabited where real people live and those on the coasts have no idea what transpires there. Used to be they were somewhat off the grid, with three TV networks and nothing else, but now there’s cable/satellite everywhere and high speed internet too but still…
Those places are different.
I lived in Utah. The Mormons look after each other. And they take family and business very seriously. That’s the difference between the people in this doc and those shows on weekend television, these people are not poor. And there have been so many stories about the fact that Mormons win reality competition shows because they know how to get along in large groups, i.e. families.
But still…
The smaller the town, the more people you know. Cities are faceless, that’s one of their appeals. Everybody’s so busy going somewhere that they don’t want to get bogged down with personal baggage. The model here is Madonna, how she kept graduating from/using one person and then another, moving up the food chain to a pedestal where she’s all alone. That’s why she’s clueless, she’s now got no frame of reference. She’s hooked on the adoration and the status but those are empty constructs.
In other words, life is more real in Pocatello than Hollywood.
But why did these people keep letting the offender in?
We had close family friends. But we knew when to say no. There were boundaries. But the level of trust here…
But the perp was manipulative. My father taught me to keep an eye out. But maybe I ended up suspicious of everyone, to my detriment. You’ve got to have a little trust in this world…
And then there’s the issue of the perp getting the parents to do things against their nature. Seems unlikely, but only if you’re sheltered. We’re all in situations where we wonder, if we back out are we missing out?
And then the brainwashing of the girl, with all the alien stuff.
Then again, the Angel Moroni is supposed to have been the last person to write in the golden plates that Joseph Smith discovered and translated and if you believe that…
You’re probably not an atheist.
Once you start believing there’s a little man in the sky who knows whether you’re naughty or nice, anything is possible.
But still, I recommend this show.
It’s no “Three Identical Strangers,” but you don’t have to leave home to watch it.
Oh, that’s right, you can see the triplet movie on demand if you’re willing to endure CNN’s commercials.
Or you can hop on to Netflix, spend ninety minutes with the Brobergs and then move on to Ted Bundy.
Really? I lived through that. But I didn’t know the Broberg story.
I’m glad I now do.
Beware.
P.S. The police can’t protect you. Sure, the Brobergs did their best to thwart the justice system’s mechanics, but if someone is out to get you, it’s rare the police or FBI can keep you safe. When someone tells you they’re gonna kill you, they just might.
