THE ORPHAN

Release Date: 20 August 2009

Language: English

Running Time: 2 hours 2 minutes

Director: John Ballard

Cast: Peter Sarsgaard, Vera Farmiga.

Synopsis:The story of a couple (Peter Sarsgaard and Vera Farmiga) that seeks adoption after losing their own child, only to welcome into their house a young girl who has a hidden evil streak underneath her sweet demeanor in the Warner Bros. picture Orphan. House of Wax's Jaume Collet-Serra directs from a script by David Leslie Johnson. Kate (Vera Farmiga) and John Coleman (Peter Sarsgaard) are experiencing strains in their marriage after Kate's third child was stillborn. The loss is particularly hard on Kate, who is still recovering from a drinking habit that cost her her job. While visiting the local orphanage, they decide to adopt Esther (Isabelle Fuhrman), a 9-year-old Russian girl. While Kate and John's daughter Max (Aryana Engineer), who is deaf-mute and communicates with sign language, embraces Esther almost immediately, their son Daniel (Jimmy Bennett) is somewhat less welcoming. Kate grows suspicious when Esther, who watched Kate and John have sex, expresses far more knowledge of sex and its slang than would be expected for a child her age. Not long after Esther arrives, she pushes a schoolmate who had picked on her off a playground slide, breaking her ankle. Max saw Esther shove the girl, but covers for Esther by saying that the girl slipped. However, Kate is further alarmed when Sister Abigail (CCH Pounder), the head of the orphanage, warns her and John about Esther's tendency to be around when things go wrong. Esther overhears this and later kills Sister Abigail with a hammer to the head. She forces Max to help her hide the body and the hammer. Daniel sees Esther and Max descending from his treehouse from behind a rock, not knowing they hid the hammer there. Later that night, Esther threatens Daniel with genital mutilation if he tells anyone what he saw. Kate is told that the Russian orphanage Esther came from has no record of her ever being there. However, John does not believe her, despite continued ominous behavior by Esther. At one point, Esther breaks her own arm in John's vise and convinces John that Kate broke it. On Esther's first day back at school, she slips Kate's SUV into neutral, nearly killing Max. Badly shaken, Kate buys two bottles of wine, but at the last minute pours one of them down the drain and leaves the other full. Kate learns that Esther was housed at a mental institution in Estonia called the Saarne Institute, but when she expresses misgivings to John, he and her counselor think that Kate is relapsing into her drinking habit. After John produces the other bottle Kate bought the night before, he threatens to leave her unless she gets help. Daniel learns of the hammer from Max and decides to get it and go to the police. However, Esther sets the treehouse on fire, intending to get rid of the evidence and kill Daniel. Daniel escapes by falling out of the tree, severely injuring his neck and knocking him unconscious. Esther tries to finish him off by smashing a brick over his head, but Max shoves her out of the way just in time. Esther again tries to kill him at the hospital by smothering him with a pillow. As doctors rush to save Daniel, Kate angrily knocks Esther down, and is sedated by doctors. That night, Esther tries to seduce a drunk John. John realizes Kate was telling the truth all along and threatens to call the orphanage, but Esther stabs him to death. Max witnesses this and hides in her laundry hamper. As Kate is coming out of sedation, she gets a call from the Saarne Institute's director, Dr. Värava (Karel Roden), who reveals that Esther isn't a 9-year-old girl at all, but a 33-year-old woman named Leena Klammer. She has hypopituitarism, a disorder that stunted her physical growth, and has spent most of her life posing as a little girl. The doctor tells Kate that Leena is dangerously psychotic, and warns her to protect her family. Kate rushes home, where Leena shoots her in the arm before searching for Max. Their chase takes them outside to a frozen pond, where Kate and Leena struggle before falling through a hole in the ice. Kate crawls out of the hole, followed by Leena, who begs for her life, addressing Kate as "Mommy" while hiding a knife behind her back. Kate angrily responds that she is not her mother, and kicks Leena in the face, breaking her neck and sending her flying back into the pond to drown. (Source: 20th Century Fox (M) Sdn. Bhd.)

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