SHOWTIME® PRESENTS AWARD-WINNING DOCUMENTARY KIDNAPPED FOR CHRIST

SHOWTIME will premiere KIDNAPPED FOR CHRIST, a powerful, award-winning documentary that chronicles the shocking truth behind Escuela Caribe, a controversial Christian behavior modification program in the Dominican Republic for “troubled” U.S. teenagers.  Initially hoping to document the positive effects a boarding school like this could have on struggling youth, evangelical filmmaker Kate Logan is granted unprecedented access and allowed to live on campus for the summer.  Once there, Logan’s eyes are opened to the truth beneath the sunny façade of this remote reform school—kids being taken by force in the middle of the night, rumors of physical abuse, and staff imposing arbitrary and degrading punishments on the young students—and encounters students who change her life.

In the 85-minute documentary, Logan meets David, a 17-year-old honor student from Colorado, sent to the program shortly after coming out to his parents; Beth, a 15-year-old from Michigan suffering from debilitating panic attacks; and Tai, a 16-year-old Haitian-American girl from Boston experimenting with drugs to cope with childhood trauma.  With mounting evidence that this so-called “therapeutic boarding school” is no more than a crude brainwashing camp, Logan is determined to help at least one student escape.  The struggles she faces to secure the child's freedom reveal just how far Escuela Caribe will go to prevent their students from leaving, becoming a journey that tests Logan's faith in ways she could never imagine.

Special Jury Award Winner of the 2014 Nashville Film Festival and the Audience Award for Best Documentary Feature at 2014 Slamdance Film Festival, KIDNAPPED FOR CHRIST is executive produced by Lance Bass, Mike C. Manning and Tom DeSanto.  KIDNAPPED FOR CHRIST is presented by REDTHORN, in association with LOOK CLOSER MEDIA.