Sweet Hostage is a 1975 American made-for-television drama film based on the novel Welcome to Xanadu by Nathaniel Benchley.[1] The film stars Linda Blair and Martin Sheen.[2] It was filmed in Taos County, New Mexico. It was featured in ABC's Friday Night Movie series.[3]Film and television critic Leonard Maltin rated the movie as "Average" in his biennial ratings guide TV Movies. In his capsule review, Maltin said "the performances by Sheen and Blair almost made this talky adaptation of the Nathaniel Benchley novel worthwhile". The film was only a moderate success in the Nielsen ratings, and failed to generate the type of provocative press which was then-standard for a Linda Blair movie.
In this made-for-television drama, a 31-year-old fugitive mental patient who quotes poetry kidnaps an illiterate, underage girl from a nearby farm and forces her to go to a lonely mountain cabin. There he teaches her to read and, ultimately, she succumbs to Stockholm Syndrome. He eventually kills himself during a shootout raid to save the girl, who reunite with her parents.
Sweet Hostage was released to DVD by Warner Home Video on November 2, 2011, as a Region 1 MOD DVD made available through Warner Archive Collection.