Now Showing: Every Secret Thing

Every Secret Thing
Biography/Crime
Director: Mark Romanek
Cast: Daisy Ridley, Anthony Mackie, Logan Lerman, Jena Malone, Billie Lourd, Alice Englert, Justin Chatwin, Jamie Chung, William Fichtner

Plot: In February 1974, 19-year-old college student and granddaughter of William Randolph Hearst, Patty Hearst is beaten unconscious and kidnapped from her Berkley, California apartment. She awakens in a dark closet, blindfolded with her hands tied. For weeks, she is only let out of the closet for meals that she remains blindfolded for. Her captures are led by Cinque (Anthony Mackie). Patty overhears her captures radical left political conversations and slowly begins to join in. Through these conversations Patty learns that Cinque is the leader of a group calling themselves the Symbionese Liberation Army consisting of Willie Wolfe aka Cujo (Logan Lerman), Angela Atwood aka General Gelina (Billie Lourd), Patricia Soltysik aka Zoya (Alice Englert), Emily Harris aka Yolanda (Jena Malone), William Harris aka General Teko (Justin Chatwin) and Wendy Yoshimura (Jamie Chung). Patty is given a flashlight and SLA writings to read while she is in the closet by Wendy, who becomes her closet friend in the group. Hearst begins a sexuual relationship with Wolfe.

The SLA announces that they have Patty Hearst and publicly demands that the Hearst family help free two SLA members who were arrested for murder. Randolph Hearst (William Fichtner), Patty's father, does not have the influence to accomplish this. Upon the failure of that plan, the SLA demands that the Hearst family distribute $70 worth of food to every needy Californian. Randolph's lawyers inform him that that would amount to over $400 million. Randolph ends up taking out a loan and immediately begins the distribution of $20 million worth of food to the poor of the Bay Area. The distribution does not go well though as it descends into chaos.

Cinque takes Hearst out of the closet and gives her the choice between death or joining the SLA. She says she will stay and fight with them. The group begins training her with weapons. The SLA releases a tape to the media of Hearst announcing that she has joined the SLA and has assumed the name "Tania".

The group gives Hearst a rifle and brings her along to rob a bank. They end up shooting two people who enter the bank during the robbery and get away with $10,000. Within days of the robbery, the media refers to Patty Hearst as a common criminal for her part in the bank robbery. After the robbery, Cinque decides that there is too much heat in the Bay Area for them to successfully operate and recruit new members, so he decides to relocate the group to Los Angeles.

William Harris and Emily Harris shoplift from a surplus store while Hearst waits in the van across the street. When William and Emily are confronted by the employees outside, Hearst shoots up the storefront with an automatic rifle. They three then run off, ditching the van. When they get back to their Los Angeles base, they find it surrounded by police. They decide to drive back up to San Francisco to hide out.

At the base, the police try unsuccessfully to get the SLA to leave the house. A SWAT team arrives and fires teargas into the house. The SLA responds by shooting at the police with automatic rifles, resulting in a long shootout. Eventually the house catches fire. When the smoke finally clears, Cinque, Wolfe, Atwood, and Zoya are all found dead in a crawl space underneath the burnt remains of the house.

Hearst helps the surviving members build pipebombs to try to kill policemen. But the bombs don't work, so Hearst and Emily Harris decide to rob another bank. Hearst waits outside as the getaway driver. Inside the bank Emily kills a woman.

San Francisco Police and the FBI raid the building Hearst and Wendy Yoshimura are hiding out in and arrest them. Hearst lists her occupation as "urban guerrilla" when booked into jail.

The defense team hired by Hearst's father tries to use a brainwashing defense in court. She ends up being convicted of armed robbery and using a firearm during a felony and ends up serving 22 months in federal prison before her sentence is commuted by President Carter.