Okay, I absolutely love this movie.

When Anna (Cystal Allen) loses her husband and one of her daughters, all in one night, it doesn’t do much for her state of mind.  Even though the official report is that the fire that killed them was due to a gas link, this is a Lifetime movie and that means that they had to have been murdered.  And since the name of this movie is Beware of Mom, it doesn’t take a lot of effort to figure out that Anna must be responsible.  However, she didn’t mean to kill her daughter.  Sometimes, you’re just trying to murder your husband and these things happen.

Anyway, Anna and her remaining daughter, teenage Jessie (Monica Rose Betz), move to another suburb and try to start their life over.  Anna is one of those moms who is determined to be the “cool mom.”  She’s friends with musicians.  She has thousands of followers on social media.  She throws big parties at her house and encourages Jessie to stay out late with her friends.

Her new neighbor, Tanya (Rene Ashton), is not a cool mom.  In fact, Tanya is an extremely overprotective, controlling mom who is determined to make sure that her daughter, 16 year-old Kylie (Nicolette Langley), is not led down the wrong path.  She expects her daughter to not date, to not dress provocatively, to not post pictures of herself online, and to not stay out late.  Needless to say, Tayna is not happy about having Anna living next door, especially after Kyle and Jessie become friends and Anna starts to encourage Kylie to rebel.

Soon, Kylie is going to parties, posing online, and making out with a 34 year-old musician!  Tanya tells Anna to stay away from her daughter.  However, Anna is not one to take orders and she also knows both how to fake a break-in and how to poison someone in such a way as to make it appear as if they’ve had a heart attack.

Beware of Mom, indeed.

As I said at the start of this review, I absolutely loved this movie.  The plot is just so melodramatic and Anna is just such an entertainingly over-the-top villain that it was impossible not to love it.  I mean, to a certain extent, anyone watching this film will be able to relate.  I think everyone went through a period where they felt like their mom wasn’t giving them enough freedom or was being overprotective.  Everyone was jealous of the girl who had the mom who apparently let her do whatever she wanted.  This is a film that acknowledges that our jealousy was understandable and then goes on to explain that the reason why the cool mom let her daughter get away with everything was because she was an insane murderer who wanted to kidnap her daughter’s best friend.  It’s so crazy that you can’t help but love it.

It helps that Crystal Allen really dug into the role of Anna.  Whether she was murdering a stranger or encouraging underage drinking, Anna seemed to believe that all of her action were very reasonable and she seemed to be genuinely bewildered that anyone would object.  Allen was well-supported by the performances of the rest of the cast, especially Monica Rose Betz as her conflicted daughter.  It all added up to the type of suburban melodrama that we can all embrace.