2000’s The Stalking of Laurie Show takes place in Pennsylvania, a wonderful state as long as you don’t count Philadelphia. Even more specifically, the film takes place in Pennsylvania Dutch country. An Amish man occasionally appears, sitting in his buggy when it moves down the road. One character, a lunkhead named Butch (Rel Hunt), goes to an Amish coffeeshop while his girlfriend is committing a horrific murder.
The Amish don’t play a huge role in The Stalking of Laurie Show, which is ultimately a story of a murder amongst high school students. Still, seeing them in the background is a reminder of a simpler life and also a reminder that not everyone is consumed by hate. That’s a welcome reminder because this film, much like our present world, is full of irrational hate.
Michelle Lambert (Marnette Patterson) is, at least when the film starts, the queen of her high school. Everyone wants to be her friend and everyone fears getting on her bad side. She’s a master manipulator, someone who obviously feels that she has the right to take whatever she wants. And yet, when we first meet her, it’s hard not to feel at least a little sympathy for her. Her homelife isn’t the best. She doesn’t get along with her father. She’s very protective of her younger siblings. Despite appearances, she’s not rich. The only reasons she has expensive clothes and makeup is because she’s very good at shoplifting. When I was a teenager, I was very good at shoplifting too so I could …. well, I don’t want to say that I related to her because there is a difference between pocketing purple eyeshadow and stealing an entire wardrobe. As well, it soon becomes clear that Michelle has a mean streak that no amount of a bad family life could justify.
Michelle takes a new student, innocent Laurie Show (Jennifer Finnigan) under her wing and, for a while, she and Laurie are best friends. But then, when Michelle’s lunkhead boyfriend Butch takes an interest in Laurie, things change. Michelle is fiercely jealous of Butch and soon, Michelle and her friends are conspiring on ways to humiliate Laurie. When Michelle gets pregnant, she drops out of school, moves into a trailer with Butch, and eventually alienates almost all of her friends after she attacks Laurie in a bowling alley parking lot. Only Tabitha (Joanne Vannicola) remains loyal to Michelle. Soon Tabitha and Michelle are plotting Laurie’s death….
Agck! It’s a disturbing story, especially since it’s true. Michelle and Tabitha murdered Laurie Snow in December of 1991, just five days before Christmas. (There’s some debate as to whether or not Butch took part in the actual murder or not.) Michelle is currently in prison while Tabitha, a juvenile at the time of the murder, was paroled in 2019. Today, of course, Michelle and her friends would have hounded Laurie online, sending her anonymous messages, filming every fight between the two of them, and telling her to “kill yourself.” Every time I read about a teenager who committed suicide due to cyberbullying, my immediate response is that they didn’t kill themselves. They were murdered. Anyone who would taunt a fragile person to the point of suicide is as guilty as if they pulled the trigger or tightened the noose themselves. And don’t give me any of that, “They didn’t know it would happen” crap either. In every case, they knew what they were doing.
As for the film itself, it’s definitely sensationalized. Marnette Patterson fully embraces the melodrama as Michelle, at first playing her as just being a standard mean girl before then going totally over-the-top as Michelle’s grip on reality becomes more and more loose. Jennifer Finnigan is sympathetic as Laurie and Jessica Greco gives a good performance as a friend of Laurie’s who is also drawn into Michelle’s crowd. If the film wasn’t based on a true story, it would probably be a camp classic. But since it is based on a true story, it works best as a plea for people to stop turning a blind eye to bullying. That’s not a bad message.
Through the Shattered Lens 