After being kidnapped by terrorists on “”24″” and getting chased around a ghost town by candle-wielding psychopaths in “”House of Wax,”” Elisha Cuthbert is beginning to seem a glutton for punishment. In “”Captivity,”” her newest suspense thriller, Cuthbert plays Jennifer Tree, a model at the peak of her popularity who is abducted and confined to a cell after getting slipped a roofie by a fanatical admirer. Though she befriends a fellow hostage in a neighboring cell, no one can prevent the damsel in distress from being gruelingly tortured by her mysterious captor. From the writer of “”Phone Booth,”” “”Captivity”” is another attempt at pushing the shock envelope – much like recent torture-fests “”Saw”” and “”Hostel”” – and has also been compared to “”Silence of the Lambs,”” which rouses the question: How many different versions of this story can there be?

The film has already been banned in many countries, even after having undergone a massive edit-overhaul to bring its rating down from NC-17 to R. In addition, large billboards for the film in both Los Angeles and New York depicting Cuthbert in four striking frames – one with her face in a cast and bloody tubes up her nose, captioned with “”Torture,”” and another with her limp frame hanging off the end of a table, captioned “”Termination”” – were taken down after complaints rose from the public concerning their graphic nature. With all this hype, there is no doubt “”Captivity”” is fighting for controversy. June 22.