James Gallenders | Through the Shattered Lens

Poor Whitney Manning!

As the central character of the Lifetime film, Homekilling Queen, Whitney (played by Kaitlyn Bernard) only wants one thing. She wants to be homecoming queen! And really, why shouldn’t she be? She believes that she’s the most popular girl in the entire school, despite the fact that no one actually seems to like her. Add to that, she’s rich and serving as homecoming queen is practically a family tradition! Her mother, Connie (Ashley Jones), was homecoming queen. So was her grandmother, Evelyn (Jennifer Dale). Both Connie and Evelyn are determined that Whitney will be the next homecoming queen. Connie’s even taught her how to do a proper pageant wave.

How determined is Whitney? She’s so determined that, over the summer, she even murdered one of her rivals! That’s determination!

Still, things are never quite as easy as they should be. For instance, Whitney may think that she has the election all sewn up but Natasha Hart (Kayleigh Shikanai) feels differently. Natasha is sick of the school being run by mean girls like Whitney. Natasha decides that she’s going to run against Whitney!

At first, Whitney is dismissive of Natasha and her campaign. Everyone knows that Natasha had a drug problem in the past. Apparently, she drove her car into the bleachers while high on oxy. (This automatically makes Natasha cooler than anyone I went to high school with.) However, Natasha is now clean and sober and looking to make the world a better place. To Whitney’s shock, Natasha starts to pick up support for her campaign. Even after Whitney sends everyone in school a nude picture that’s been photoshopped to look like Natasha, Natasha’s campaign continues to build momentum.

Well, if photoshopped nudes won’t knock Natasha out of the race, how about planting drugs on her? And if Whitney has to murder someone to get those drugs …. well, that’s politics.

It’s an interesting film. On the one hand, you’re supposed to dislike Whitney, Connie, and Evelyn. And it is true that Whitney does commit a murder or two. On the other hand, they’re all so determined to win that homecoming election that you can’t help but admire the level of their dedication. If it means giving students gifts to win their vote, Whitney’s willing to do it. If it means seducing the school’s creepy principal to keep her daughter from being disqualified, Connie’s going to do just that. Kaitlyn Bernard, Ashley Jones, and Jennifer Dale all really dig into their roles and do a great job at capturing the unhinged obsessiveness of their characters. Jennifer Dale is especially a marvel as the coldy pragmatic Evelyn. When she glares at anyone who would stand in her granddaughter’s way, you’re left with no doubt that Evelyn is not someone who you would want to mess with. She’s scary but you would definitely want her to have your back in a confrontation.

Also doing a good job were Kayleigh Shikanai and Krista Bridges, who were perfectly cast as mother and daughter. Every scene between them rang true and, watching them, I was reminded of the way that my mom and I would relate to each other. They brought an unexpected sense of reality to a film that could have otherwise just been an enjoyably over-the-top melodrama.

Homekilling Queen was a lot of fun and, given the number of times that Lifetime rebroadcasts all of their films over the year, it’s one to keep an eye out for.

After I finished up The Other Wife, I continued to clean out my DVR by rewatching Mommy’s Little Girl.

Mommy’s Little Girl, was premiered on Lifetime on March 19th, is a crazy little kid movie. How crazy? Well, the film is also known as Mommy’s Little Murderer and for good reason! Speaking for myself, I always enjoy a good crazy kid movie because this entire genre is built around an uncomfortable truth: Children are creepy! They’ve got those squeaky voices and they’re always staring and they don’t have a filter so you never know what they’re going to say to you. Even worse, it’s somehow considered socially unacceptable to snap at a stranger’s child, even if it’s obvious that stranger has no idea how to raise their children.

Plus, you have to consider that every serial killer was a child at some point. If a child did decide to kill you, he’d probably get away with it. You wouldn’t think to be cautious if you were alone with him because everyone assumes that children always have the best intentions. No investigator would give serious consideration to the possibility that you were murdered by a child. Even if the kid was arrested, he’d only be charged as a minor. He would ultimately end up with a clean record while you just ended up as some sort of dumbass ghost haunting the landfill where he dumped your body.

Seriously, people need to think about this stuff before they deal with children.

Consider Sadie Connell (Emma Hentschel), the title character of Mommy’s Little Girl. Sadie is only 11 years old and, as cute and innocent-looking as she may be, when we first meet her, she’s already killed at least one person. She arranged for her abusive grandfather to take a nasty tumble down a flight of stairs. In fact, not only did she kill her grandfather but she also stole his lighter. She claims that it’s a magic lighter and, despite being a non-smoker, Sadie finds many uses for that flame. For instance, she can use the lighter to threaten her dolls. And when a classmate bullies her, she uses the lighter to punish his prized action figures.

Over the course of the movie, Sadie commits a few more murders. She pushes people off cliffs. She poisons their food. At one point, she even places her hands over one unfortunate victim’s mouth and helps to suffocate her. Sadie is definitely a little bit psycho and yet, as a viewer, I couldn’t help but feel some sympathy for her. Both her grandparents treated her so badly that you can’t blame Sadie for being a little bit bitter. As for her classmate with his precious action figures — well, nobody likes a bully.

At the start of the film, Sadie is finally reunited with her mother, Theresa (Fiona Gubelmann), who has issues of her own when Sadie was born and, as a result, allowed her daughter to be raised by her parents. However, Theresa now has her life together and is ready to raise her daughter! Sadie is so excited to finally have a family but she’s also extremely paranoid of losing that family. Some of the film’s best scenes come when Sadie fears that she’s about to be rejected and sent back to her grandmother. Sadie never becomes a one-dimensional villain. The end result is a Lifetime film that actually makes you think.

Keep an eye out for Mommy’s Little Girl!