Here is the trailer for The Kidnapping of Arabella, a crime-comedy-drama that follows the road trip of an 8-year-old runaway, Arabella, and lost spirit Holly, who is convinced that the girl is a version of herself from the past.
Carolina Cavalli directs the film, which marks her second feature following her 2022 debut, Amanda.
Starring Benedetta Porcaroli, Lucrezia Guglielmino, and Chris Pine, The Kidnapping of Arabella opens in theaters on July 17, 2026.
In the film, Holly spends days at her dead-end job fantasizing about holes in the space-time continuum and wondering where her life went wrong. When she meets Arabella, an eight-year-old rebel hoping to run away from her self-absorbed author father, Holly becomes convinced their meeting is a cosmic sign, and that Arabella is, in fact, her past self sent back for a second chance. The two embark on an unconventional road trip between two lost souls who might be exactly what the other needs.
Cavalli says her inspiration for the film was thinking about how “we can always imagine different lives, but can only live one. That was interesting to me, and I wanted to see how this character would act on her feelings of being stuck in the past. She’s not able to live her life as it is, and eventually, she has to accept reality, but she also has to accept the fact that she has become an adult”.
Critics are finding the kooky road movie charming but question whether the multiple storylines take away from the film’s primary relationship. Loud and Clear’s review noted, “Thanks to its clever script and wonderful performances, the film will have its audience laugh out loud and tear up within the same scene, as we also join the characters in their journey of self-discovery.”
In their review, The Hollywood Review pointed out, “The core Holly-Arabella plotline might have worked much better on its own, enough to make a punchy-peculiar medium-length short, especially if the filmmakers had shed some of the unnecessary montages showing the two leads driving around in cars or hanging out in hotel rooms, the dialogue turned down and various catchy vintage pop tunes turned up so as to create a hipster music-video vibe.”
Watch the official trailer for The Kidnapping of Arabella above.
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.