Fortress (1985) on Netflix
NR19851h 28mDramaHorrorThriller
Outback teacher Sally Jones has nine pupils, aged six to sixteen, in a one-room school. Four armed men in Halloween masks walk in and take them away in a van.
- Watch on NetflixThis title is not on Netflix right now. Please check back later for updates.
- Watch on NordVPN
- Netflix3.5/5
- IMDb7.0/103,827 votes
- Rotten TomatoesNot available
Trailer
Plot summary
Sally Jones is the only teacher at a one-room school in the Outback, with nine pupils aged six to sixteen. One day the younger children say they have seen cartoon characters at the edges of the playground, which Sally takes to be make-believe. Then four men in Halloween masks, armed, walk into the school, led by one she calls Father Christmas for his mask, and force her and the children into a van. She tells the pupils to bring their knapsacks and lunches and to do as the men say. On the road, the older students overhear the kidnappers talk of a ransom and of killing one child a day. Feigning innocence, Sally asks the men to stop and rest, and quietly tells one of the children to slip into the woods and bring help.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Fortress (1985)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Crawford Productions and HBO wanted Bess Armstrong to play the lead, but Actors Equity objected and Sigrid Thornton was accepted as a compromise. Two months before shooting Thornton became pregnant, the backers insisted on Armstrong, Equity would not relent, and the film shut down with $700,000 already spent.
- Gabrielle Lord's novel Fortress, the source of the film, was inspired by the 1972 Faraday School kidnapping of an isolated rural single-teacher school and was influenced by William Golding's 1954 novel Lord of the Flies.
