Cleaning Out The DVR: Psycho Brother-in-Law (dir by Jose Montesinos)

Posted on January 3, 2018 by Lisa Marie Bowman

(Hi there! So, as you may know because I’ve been talking about it on this site all year, I have got way too much stuff on my DVR. Seriously, I currently have 186 things recorded! I’ve decided that, on January 15th, I am going to erase everything on the DVR, regardless of whether I’ve watched it or not. So, that means that I’ve now have only have a month to clean out the DVR! Will I make it? Keep checking this site to find out! I recorded Psycho Brother-in-Law off of the Lifetime Movie Network on December 28th, 2017!)

From our friends at the Asylum comes a film about love, marriage, family, and murder!

You may think that Eric (Mike Duff) has the perfect life. He’s got a good job and a nice house. He has a loving wife named Kay (Brittany Falardeau) and an intelligent teenage daughter named Laura (Megan Ashley Brown). Good for Eric, right?

However, scratch the surface and you start to discover that things aren’t quite as perfect as they may appear.

Eric’s good job is keeping him away from his home and his family. That nice house isn’t cheap and it’s big enough to store a lot of hurt feelings.

He sees his wife Kay (Brittany Falardeau) so sporadically that she has been reduced to scheduling sex with him. “After date night?”

Laura, meanwhile, is dating Ron (Billy Meade) and we all know that Ron is bad news because he plays the guitar and he’s always hanging out in the high school’s hallway, instead of actually going to class. Eric says that he thinks Ron is a punk. Kay thinks Eric is overprotective.

And then, there’s David.

David (Zack Gold) is Eric’s brother. One night, he mysteriously shows up at the front door, needing some place to stay. At first, David seems like a good guy to have around the house. He’s seems to be a nice guy. He’s good at fixing stuff. When Eric misses date night, David takes Kay to a movie. When Laura rolls her eyes a little too much at her mom, David reminds Laura about how hard Kay has been working.

But there are little hints that David has some issues. For one thing, he has trouble holding down a job and he’s remarkably tight-lipped about what he’s been doing for the past few years. For another thing, Eric doesn’t seem to be too happy to see him, even though David is always willing to beat up anyone who gives his brother a hard time. It seems that David is a bit overprotective himself. He’s the type of guy who you never know whether he’s going to use a wrench to fix the sink or to bash your head in.

Of course, the main clue that we have that something is wrong with David is the title of the movie. Since David and Eric are the only brothers in the film and Eric is the only one of them who is married, it doesn’t take much thought to figure out who is going to be the psycho…

BUT NO MATTER! I love Asylum films like this. The Asylum is so shameless and unapologetic about embracing the melodrama that you can’t help but love them. I fell in love with this film as soon as David’s eyes bugged out when some fat slob accidentally bumped into Eric at the bar. I was like, “Yes, this movie is totally going to live up to its title!”

And it did! This was a fun movie, with Zack Gold totally turning it up to 11 in the role of the psycho brother-in-law. According to the imdb, it only cost $200,000 to produce Psycho Brother-in-Law. It was money well spent.

Cleaning Out The DVR: Cradle Swapping (dir by Michael Feifer)

Posted on January 3, 2018 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This year, there was a surprisingly large number of Lifetime films about babies either getting kidnapped or switched at birth. If Lifetime films tend to use to melodrama to bring to life the fears of its audiences, 2017 was a year when everyone was scared about who or what their baby would grow up to be.

In Cradle Swapping, Grandma (played by Patrika Darbo) takes one look at the baby that her daughter has brought home from the hospital and announces that it doesn’t look anything like her supposed parents. Needless to say, neither Alicia (Amanda Clayton) or Ray (Brandon Barash) are happy to hear this. They argue that all babies look the same.

No, Grandma says, all of her babies looked exactly like her.

Of course, that’s not the only time that Grandma points this out. Later, after Alicia and Ray have just returned from the hospital with their baby, Grandma takes another look at it and announces that the baby still looks nothing like her mother or father. This time, Alicia gets even more upset about it. “Way to go,” everyone tells Grandma.

Grandma actually has a pretty good point but it’s understandable why Alicia doesn’t want to hear it. Alicia already has a lot to deal with. Baby Hannah refuses to look her in the eye. Baby Hannah refuses to breastfeed. Baby Hannah is always crying. When Alicia and Ray take Hannah to the hospital, a doctor demands to know if Alicia has ever used drugs. “Just in college,” Alicia replies, “experimenting.”

It turns out that Hannah is going through opioid withdrawal!

At first, Ray blames Alicia for taking prescription medication. Alicia blames Ray for not being supportive. Maybe they should be redirecting their blame at hospital…

See, it turns out that Hannah is not their baby. Instead, their baby was taken by the incredibly sleazy Tony (Tyler Johnson), who left another baby in her place. Getting little help from the hospital or the authorities, Alicia and Ray take matters into their own hands, setting out to track down Tony and find their baby. However, what they don’t know is that Tony is involved in a much bigger conspiracy than they even suspect….

I have to admit that I liked Cradle Swapping more than I thought I would. Amanda Clayton and Brandon Barash were sympathetic as the parents and they were easy to relate to. I appreciated the fact that they started the movie in over their heads and they were still in over their heads when the movie ended. They never turned into action heroes or superhuman investigators. Instead, they were just two ordinary parents trying to find their baby. You want them to succeed and the end result is an above average Lifetime film.

Here’s The 2nd Trailer For Eli Roth’s Death Wish!

Posted on January 3, 2018 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Judging from the majority of the comments on YouTube, a lot of people do not seem to understand that Eli Roth’s upcoming Death Wish is a remake of an earlier film. And the few who do realize it seem to be under the impression that it’s either a remake of one of the Punisher films or a rip-off of The Foreigner.

I mean, seriously, that’s kinda pathetic. There’s no excuse not to know your film history.

Anyway, here’s the 2nd trailer for Death Wish! It doesn’t really look that good but hopefully, it’ll still be better than The Brave One!

I Dare You To Watch The Trailer For Truth or Dare

Posted on January 3, 2018 by Lisa Marie Bowman

AGCK! Those smiles are creepy!

Otherwise, Truth or Dare basically looks like a remake of It Follows with a little bit of The Ring tossed in. I have a bad feeling that this is going to be one of those movies where the entire plot is dependent on everyone being beyond dumb but as long as it’s scary, who cares?

Things Get Creepy With The Slender Man Trailer!

Posted on January 3, 2018 by Lisa Marie Bowman

You know, I think we all know that the Slender Man movie is not going to be that good but the trailer, which dropped earlier today, certainly is creepy!

Here’s the trailer:

(Myself, I’m hoping the 2019 will see the release of a related film called Fat Man, to be followed in 2020 by Slender Man vs. Fat Man.)

Cleaning Out The DVR: The Wrong Mother (dir by Craig Goldstein)

Posted on January 3, 2018 by Lisa Marie Bowman

(Hi there! So, as you may know because I’ve been talking about it on this site all year, I have got way too much stuff on my DVR. Seriously, I currently have 187 things recorded! I’ve decided that, on January 15th, I am going to erase everything on the DVR, regardless of whether I’ve watched it or not. So, that means that I’ve now have only have a month to clean out the DVR! Will I make it? Keep checking this site to find out! I recorded The Wrong Mother off of Lifetime on April 8th, 2017!)

(aka The Wrong Mother)

The Wrong Mother is a pretty typical example of a type of Lifetime movie that I like to call a “Trust No One Film.”

These films always deal with the same basic plot. Take a perfect family, consisting of a perfect wife, a perfect husband, at least one perfect kid, and a perfectly outspoken best friend. Open the film by establishing that they all live in a perfect house. Then, the wife makes the mistake of inviting a seemingly friendly person into the house and suddenly, things aren’t so perfect anymore. Suddenly, the husband is being tempted. The wife is being deceived. The children are being brainwashed. And the best friend usually ends up either dead or in the hospital. It all happened because the wife trusted someone. If only she had been willing to embrace her paranoia.

In The Wrong Mother, the perfect wife is Kaylene (Vanessa Marcil), who is run down by a SUV one day while she’s out jogging. The perfect husband is Drew (Stephen Snedden), who works as an airline pilot and is often not home. The perfect best friend is Samantha (Elizabeth Bond), who immediately realizes that the key to Kaylene’s recovery will be Kaylene washing her hair and not spending too much time in bed. The two perfect children are twins and they’re just adorable. And the perfect stranger is a nurse named Vanessa (Brooke Nevin). After meeting Kaylene and Drew in the hospital, she talks them into hiring her as a home care giver. Soon, Vanessa is lounging around the pool in a bikini and forcing Kaylene to take all sorts of pills. Vanessa is so dangerous that she even wears Lolita-style sunglasses. Samantha suspects that Vanessa might be hiding something…

And she’s right!

For one thing, Vanessa isn’t actually a nurse. She’s just someone who was hanging out around the hospital. For another thing, she knows that Kaylene had the twins via in vitro fertilization. In fact, Vanessa donated the eggs. Now, Vanessa wants the children for her own and she’s willing to go to any lengths to get them, even murder.

The lesson here? TRUST NO ONE!

Anyway, The Wrong Mother is a fairly typical Lifetime film. Once you’ve seen enough of these films, it becomes fairly easy to predict everything that’s going to happen and that certainly was the case with The Wrong Mother. (At this point, I can usually guess how many commercial breaks will pass before the best friend has an unfortunate “accident.”) The main reason to watch this movie is for the performance of Brooke Nevin, who delivers her snarky asides and rolls her eyes with such enthusiasm that she provides The Wrong Mother with a few enjoyable sparks.

Cleaning Out The DVR: Stage Fright (dir by Fred Olen Ray)

Posted on January 2, 2018 by Lisa Marie Bowman

(Hi there! So, as you may know because I’ve been talking about it on this site all year, I have got way too much stuff on my DVR. Seriously, I currently have 188 things recorded! I’ve decided that, on January 15th, I am going to erase everything on the DVR, regardless of whether I’ve watched it or not. So, that means that I’ve now have only have a month to clean out the DVR! Will I make it? Keep checking this site to find out! I recorded Stage Fright off of the Lifetime Movie Network on January 29th, 2017!)

(aka Stage Fright)

Right above this sentence, you’ll see the original “poster art” for the film that was eventually broadcast on the Lifetime Movie Network as Stage Fright. Even though the title changed (and personally, I think Stage Fright does carry a bit more oomph than Her Final Bow), I love this poster. It’s just so melodramatic and I like how the stalker’s blue eye is staring straight at the viewer. Even though the scene itself never actually occurs in the film, the poster still tells you everything that you need to know about this movie. If I saw a paperback novel with this poster as the cover, I would definitely buy it and probably read it in one sitting.

Stage Fright tells the story of Sarah Conrade (Jordan Ladd). At one time, Sarah was one of the most popular and famous opera singers in the world. But then she was attacked by an obsessed fan. Though he was subsequently gunned down by the police, he left Sarah with scars that are both physical and mental. After she had a nervous breakdown, Sarah retired from performing and devoted her time to raising her daughter, Haley (Savannah Osborn). However, one day, Sarah gets a call from a producer, letting her know that another singer is planning to perform Sarah’s signature songs and claim them as her own. Though Sarah may be frightened of stepping back out on the stage, she’s a performer and she has her pride. Sarah agrees to make a comeback and perform for one night only.

A lot of people are happy to hear this but it’s debatable whether any of them are as happy as Kevin (Peter Stickles). Kevin works in a music store and he is one of Sarah’s biggest fans. When she happens to step into the store, he not only tells her that he listens to her voice regularly but he also contrives to take a quick look in her purse. Of course, Kevin also has a shrine to her in his house. That’s … well, that’s a little bit creepy…

Audiences have waited for years for Sarah to make a comeback and now that she’s making it, the people around her are mysteriously dying. The police even suspect that Sarah might have something to do with it. Of course, we suspect the truth…

State Fright was directed by Fred Olen Ray, who is a veteran of these type of thrillers and who specializes in giving the audience what it wants. In this case, the audience wants melodrama and Stage Fright certainly delivers that. (Ray also delivers some effectively creepy shots of characters running around in the dank, lower levels of the opera house.) Personally, I would have liked it if there had been a little more mystery about the identity of Sarah’s stalker but Jordan Ladd gave a good performance as Sarah and the mother-daughter relationship between Sarah and Haley felt real. This is an entertaining little Lifetime movie that delivers exactly what it promises.

Here’s The Final Trailer for Liam Neeson In The Commuter!

Posted on January 2, 2018 by Lisa Marie Bowman

I have a theory that the Taken films, Non-Stop, and the upcoming The Commuter are really just documentaries about the every day life of Liam Neeson. I think Neeson retired from acting in 2009 and since that time, he’s been just been traveling around the world and beating people up.

That’s my theory anyway.

The Commuter is the latest film in the Neeson documentary series. In this one, he gets involved in intrigue on a train. This movie is scheduled to come out in a few weeks and, since it’s a January release, we will probably have forgotten about it by March.

Here’s The Trailer For Fifty Shades Freed!

Posted on January 2, 2018 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Yes, it’s time for this again.

I have to say, though, this trailer amuses the Hell out of me. It’s almost as if the trailer is trying to be snarky about the film that it’s advertising. I especially enjoyed the Saved By The Bell-style acting when Ana told the architect to stay away from her man and to call her “Mrs. Grey.”

And then, that ending.

“You’re pregnant, Mrs. Grey.”

Apparently, the doctor got the memo about Ana’s new name. So, that’s a good thing, I guess.

Anyway, here’s the trailer…

(If you need a refresher on what this is all about, why not check out my reviews of Fifty Shades of Grey and Fifty Shades Darker?)

Cleaning Out The DVR: The Sandman (dir by Peter Sullivan)

Posted on January 2, 2018 by Lisa Marie Bowman

(Hi there! So, as you may know because I’ve been talking about it on this site all year, I have got way too much stuff on my DVR. Seriously, I currently have 189 things recorded! I’ve decided that, on January 15th, I am going to erase everything on the DVR, regardless of whether I’ve watched it or not. So, that means that I’ve now have only have a month to clean out the DVR! Will I make it? Keep checking this site to find out! I recorded The Sandman off of the SyFy on October 14th!)

Madison (Shae Smolik) is a little girl who appears to have some issues.

For instance, her father just died under the most mysterious of circumstances. One of the last things that he did before he died was get paranoid when a police car drove by him. He was carrying a gun when he died, as well. Also, he died right in front of Madison.

Madison ends up at the hospital, where she has violent nightmares and struggles so much with the doctors and the orderlies that she has to be strapped down. Since both of her parents are dead, a call is made to her Aunt Claire (Haylie Duff). Claire is willing to adopt Madison but Child Protective Services is a bit less enthusiastic. Claire is unmarried and hasn’t always been the most responsible adult. She currently works as a photographer, taking pictures of aspiring Bettie Pages in her garage. Can Claire not only prove herself to be a good mother but also solve the mystery of what happened to Madison’s father?

You probably read that plot description and thought to yourself, “That sounds like a typical Lifetime film.” And certainly, there is a bit of Lifetime to be found in this SyFy movie. Peter Sullivan has produced, written, and directed several films that have appeared on both SyFy and Lifetime. Haylie Duff is a regular Lifetime actress. For a financially struggling photographer, Claire certainly does live in a nice, big house, which is one of the most familiar signs that you might be watching Lifetime film.

However, make no doubt about it, this is definitely not a Lifetime film.

You see, the reason why Madison is a nightmare to deal with it is because she’s linked to a monster. The reason why Madison is an orphan is because the monster killed her father. And now that Madison is living with Claire, the monster is coming for both of them.

And what a monster! Seriously, the Sandman is about as frightening as a SyFy monster can get. As you can probably guess from the name, he’s made of sand. The best way to avoid him, of course, would be to go some place where there is no sand but good luck with that. SAND IS EVERYWHERE! The Sandman pops up whenever Madison is in danger.

Nosy neighbor wants to know about Madison’s father? Here comes the Sandman, pouring in through the kitchen faucet!

Hospital doctor planning on recommending that Madison be institutionalized? Sandman!

In fact, anyone who poses a threat to Madison, whether real or perceived, can expect a visit from the Sandman.

Tobin Bell plays Valentine, a government agent who thinks that Madison could be weaponized. He’s probably right but seriously, everyone should know better than to mess with the Sandman. That said, it’s always fun when Tobin Bell is in one of these movies. He’s just such a good villain.

The Sandman was a good mix of Lifetime family melodrama and SyFy horror. As the aunt and the seriously disturbed niece, Haylie Duff and Shae Smolik were believable and sympathetic and the Sandman made for a memorable monster. Watch this movie the next time you’re planning on spending a weekend at the beach.