Tag Archives: Lifetime

Lifetime Film Review: Psycho Yoga Instructor (dir by Brian Herzlinger)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Oh hell yeah!

This Lifetime film had me as soon as I saw the title.  Psycho Yoga Instructor?  Seriously, is that not the most brilliant title of all time?  Apparently, this film was originally called The Perfect Pose and that’s an okay title.  I mean, “perfect” is always a good word to use in a title.  But you know what’s an even better word to use?  Psycho!

Plus, the fact that the title promised not just a psycho but a psycho yoga instructor made me even more excited to see the film.  There’s been countless Lifetime film about yoga instructors who ended up getting stalked.  But this film’s title shakes things up.  This time, it’s the yoga instructor who is the stalker!

Anyway, Psycho Yoga Instructor tells the story of Justine (Ashley Wood).  Justine is married to Tom (Brady Smith), who is the type of guy who stays at work late and then, when he gets home, doesn’t even bother to join his wife in bed.  Instead, he collapses on the couch, where she inevitably finds him the next morning.  Justine is eager to adopt a baby.  Tom barely seems to care.  Justine is haunted by nightmares in which she’s drowning in the tub and, instead of trying to save her, Tom takes a call from work.

Justine’s best friend, Ginnie (Lily Rains), thinks that Tom is cheating on Justine.  She also thinks that Justine should come to her yoga class and ogle the hot yoga instructor, Dominic (Panos Vlahos).  Justine is reasonably sure that Tom is not cheating but she still decides that yoga might help her deal with some of her stress.

Dominic, it turns out, is a very good yoga instructor.  He’s got wild hair and he spends a lot of time talking about toxins and the barriers that people set up to their own happiness.  He takes an interest in Justine and soon, he’s even coming to Justine’s house to give her one-and-one lessons.  Justine thinks that Dominic is helping her get in touch with what she really wants out of life.  Dominic, meanwhile, spends most of his time staring down Justine’s shirt.  Like, seriously, Dom — eyes up!

Tom starts to get jealous and with good reason.  Justine is having all sorts of dreams about Dominic and, for the most part, they never end well for Tom.  Still, it’s just yoga, right?  And Dominic’s not any more quirky than the typical yoga guy, right?  Wrong.  It turns out that Dominic is more than just a somewhat spacey hot guy.  He’s also a …. PSYCHO YOGA INSTRUCTOR!

Admittedly, it does take a while to get around to the psycho part of Psycho Yoga Instructor but I still liked the film.  The character of Dominic was so hilariously vapid and Panos Vlahos seemed to be having so much fun smirking and talking about toxins that it was impossible not to enjoy his performance.  Justine’s recurring dreams were also well-shot and genuinely creepy.  The one where Justine was under water while her husband laughed at her especially got to me.  The film was as cheerfully trashy as you would hope that a film with a title like Psycho Yoga Instructor would be.  In the end, that’s what really matters.

Lifetime Film Review: Murder in the Vineyard (dir by Craig Goldstein)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

If you’ve watched enough Lifetime films, you know that it’s rarely a good thing when you’re living near a vineyard.

I mean, sure, there’s a certain amount of romance to them.  Any single mom who lives in a house near a vineyard is guaranteed to meet at least one handsome stranger.  And, of course, living near a vineyard always means that you have a steady supply of wine so that you can have a fun girl’s night with your sassy, sex-obsessed best friend.

But, seriously, bad stuff happens in those vineyards.  It seems like people are always getting chased around the vineyards.  Often times, spending a night in the vineyards is a good way to get yourself murdered.  Even if you somehow manage to survive your night in the vineyards, there’s still a good chance that you’ll end up getting kidnapped and tied up in someone’s wine cellar.  Vineyards just aren’t worth the trouble.  As if to prove my point, Murder in the Vineyard aired on Lifetime on July 18th.  I recorded it on my DVR (which, unlike a vineyard, is always a good place to visit) and then I watched it earlier today.

Murder in the Vineyard starts off on a good note by featuring a murder in a vineyard.  Within the first few minutes, the film has already lived up to its name and that’s definitely something that I appreciated.  Once we get the first murder out of the way, we met Emma Kirk (Helena Mattsson) and her teenage daughter, Bea (Emma Fuhrmann).  Emma has just taken over the family winery and Bea is struggling to fit in at her new school.  While Emma reconnects with a childhood love, Bea strikes up a tentative relationship with the school football star.

Unfortunately, not everyone at the school is happy about the idea of Bea showing up out of nowhere and dating one of the most popular guys in the class.  The snobby cheerleaders, who we’re told have a history of hazing new students, start to target her.  Suddenly, there’s a website that’s devoted exclusively to harassing Bea.  Nasty rumors are being spread about her at school.  When she goes to a party, someone slips something into her drink.  Someone is targeting Bea and, as you might guess from that murder that we saw earlier in the movie, that someone is prepared to go to extremes.

As far as dangerous vineyard movies are concerned, Murder in the Vineyard was a good one.  There was enough suspense over who was harassing Bea that the film worked as a mystery and the scenes when Emma reconnects with Luke (Daniel Hall) were enjoyable.  Helena Mattsson and Daniel Hall made for a cute couple so you definitely hoped the best for them.  Mattsson and Emma Fuhrmann were also believable as mother and daughter and anyone who was overprotected by their mom will be able to relate to some of what Bea goes through.  Probably the best thing about the film is that the vineyard was pretty.  It was a bit like a Lifetime version of Sideways, in that as much emphasis was put on the beauty of the California landscape as on the plot.  If someone’s going to get murdered in your vineyard, it should at least be a pretty one.

Lifetime Film Review: Mile High Escorts (dir by Sam Irvin)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Mile High Escorts aired on Lifetime on July 19th.  Because I was hosting the #ScarySocial live tweet of City of the Living Dead, I missed it but thanks to my DVR, I was able to record it and watch it earlier today.  Seriously, will there ever be a better invention than the DVR?

Mile High Escorts tells the story of Lauren (Saxon Sharbino).  Lauren is a flight attendant.  She gets to fly all over the world and she’s even put in a request to be assigned to the Paris route.  How could her life get any better?  Well, don’t ever take your happiness for granted because reality soon intrudes on Lauren’s perfect world.  The airline announces that they’re going to be cutting back on flights, which means that Lauren and her friend Ashley (Kara Royster) are going to be flying less and also making a lot less money!  But Lauren needs that money because her father is on the verge of getting kicked out of his home.  And Ashley needs the money because …. well, Hell, who doesn’t need money?  (I totally related to Ashley.)

Fortunately, a chance meeting with Hannah (Christina Moore) might be just the solution to Lauren and Ashley’s problems.  Hannah owns a private airline and she’s always looking for new flight attendants.  Because her airline is exclusively used by wealthy, handsome, and single (if just for the weekend) men, her flight attendants have to be attractive and they have to be friendly.  They also have to be willing to spend time with their clients even after the airplane has landed.  She offers Lauren a job but Lauren, at first, is reluctant.  It sounds too much like an escort service to her, largely because it is.  But then Lauren’s hours get cut and her father’s unpaid bills start to pile up and soon, Lauren and Ashley are mile high escorts!

At first, everything seems great but, as we soon discover, the life of a mile high escort is not a simple one.  Sure, at first, it’s a lot of fun.  All of the passengers are handsome and rich and like to have a good time.  Lauren even makes a connection with Thomas (Esteban Benito), who appears to be a rare nice guy.  But this is a Lifetime movie so you know the fun can’t last.  It turns out that the private airline business is indeed a shady one and someone is murdering mile high escorts.  Can Lauren and Ashley figure out what’s going on before they become the next victims?

I absolutely loved Mile High Escorts.  This movie had everything that I love about Lifetime movies.  The plot was melodramatic and full of scheming and sex.  The clothes were to die for.  The men were handsome.  Christina Moore did a great job keeping you guessing as to Hannah’s motivations and both Saxon Sharbino and Kara Royster were likable in the lead roles.  This was a fun Lifetime film.  You don’t watch a film like this and worry about whether or not the plot makes total sense.  You certainly don’t watch a film like this because you’re hoping for a realistic portrait of what it means to be a mile high escort.  You watch a film like this because it’s fun!  And Mile High Escorts definitely was.

 

Cleaning Out The DVR: Black Hearted Killer (dir by Roxy Shih)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Earlier tonight, I continued my quest to clean out my DVR by watching the Lifetime film, Black Hearted Killer.  This originally aired on April 5th and I missed it because …. well, to be honest, I don’t remember why I missed it.  I mean, April 5th — that was like a month ago which, in 2020 time, is the equivalent of several years.  Well, whatever my reason for missing it was, I’m sure it was an acceptable one.  Fortunately, I set my DVR to record the film.

Black Hearted Killer tells the story of three people and one heart.  When their daughter is tragically killed in an auto accident, Juley (Julie McNiven) and Dennis (Jon Abrahams) agree to donate her organs.  They don’t want to know who is going to get their daughter’s organs but they do agree to allow the hospital to tell the recipients where the organs came from.  Months later, Juley and Dennis are approached by Vera (Kelley Jackle).  Vera tells them that she has their daughter’s heart beating away inside of her and that she owes her life to them.  Dennis is like, “That’s nice.  Go away now.”  Juley, however, invites Vera to become a part of their life.

Juley is still struggling to recover from her daughter’s death.  She’s still haunted by nightmares.  Having Vera around allows Juley to feel as if she’s close to her daughter.  Dennis, however, is more suspicious of Vera and the effect that she’s having on Juley.  Dennis suspects that Vera’s motives may not be pure.  Not surprisingly (because this is a Lifetime film after all), it turns out that Dennis is right.

Black Hearted Killer is an entertaining Lifetime film.  By this point, we all kind of know what the general plot of these films is going to be.  From the minute that Vera shows up, we know that she can’t be trusted just because she’s a stranger in a Lifetime films and strangers always turn out to be trouble in these films.  The fact that the plot is kind of predictable is really one of the main appeals of a film like this.  We don’t watch to be surprised.  Instead, we watch so we can shake our heads at characters who apparently haven’t seen as many Lifetime films as we have.  In this film, it didn’t really take Vera long to show her true nature and she was an entertaining psycho.  Kelley Jackle did a good job playing her and Julie McNiven and Jon Abrahams were both well-cast as the couple who she victimizes.  I also liked Juley and Dennis’s house which, as veteran Lifetime observes know, is a very important part of any successful Lifetime movie.  The nicer the house, the better the movie.

As I watched the film, I found myself thinking about organ donation.  I guess, if I died and my organs were donated to someone else, it wouldn’t bother me because I would be dead and I probably wouldn’t know what was happening.  A part of me does worry about getting stranded in Purgatory without my liver but I guess I’d make do.  Still, I would have to wonder who would end up with my mismatched eyes or my heart or my …. well, you get the idea.  I would hope it wouldn’t be anyone mean.  If you get one of my organs, treat it nicely.

 

Cleaning Out The DVR: A Killer In My Home (dir by Farhad Mann)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

When the lockdown was first announced down here in Texas, my initial reaction was, “Well, at least I can clean out my DVR now….”

Unfortunately, it didn’t really work out like that.  First off, I got caught up trying to work my way through my collection of DVDs and Blu-rays.  Then, I ended up getting distracted by my efforts to binge my way through The Sopranos, Oz, and Deadwood.  And suddenly, here we are!  It’s nearly June.  The lockdown is in the process of ending.  And I’ve barely made a dent on working my way through the 230 programs that I have on my DVR.

Earlier today, I decided to finally get to work by watching the Lifetime film, A Killer In My Home.  A Killer In My Home originally aired on the Lifetime Movie Network back in February.  I was on vacation at the time so my wonderful sister was nice enough to record it for me.  Watching it was an interesting experience, just because there weren’t any COVID-19-themed commercials.  Instead, there were a ton of commercials for Tom Steyer and Mike Bloomberg.  I mean, seriously — whenever you think about how bad 2020 may be right now, just remember that, even before everything shut down, we had to spend a month and a half dealing with the Tom and Mike charm offensive.

As for the film itself, it tells the story of Allison Wright (Bree Williamson) and her daughter, Hollie (Hannah Vandenbygaart).  Allison and Hollie appear to have the perfect life.  Not only do they live in a huge house but Hollie appears to have the perfect future ahead of her.  Soon, she’ll graduate high school, get a nice car, and go to a good college.  But then, Allison’s husband and Hollie’s father suffers a heart attack!  While he’s dying in the hospital, he’s visited by Jenna Fallon (Krista Bridges) and her withdrawn son, Joshua (Percy Hynes White).  When Allison demands to know why Jenna is visiting her dying husband, Jenna explains that she had an affair with Allison’s husband and Joshua was the result.  Apparently, Allison’s husband spent years visiting and financially supporting Jenna and Joshua.  Now that he’s dead, Jenna and Joshua have no one left to provide for them.

Now, if you were Allison, what would you do in this situation?

Would you say, “Tough shit, you whore.  Get out of here and take that bastard with you!”

Or

Would you say, “Why don’t you come live in our guest house?”

Now, to the film’s credit, Allison’s initial reaction is to tell Jenna and Joshua to go away.  However, a few weeks later, Allison has a change of heart and she allows Jenna and Joshua to move into the guest house.  Jenna and her son are supposed to stay away from the main house and out of Allison and Hollie’s lives.  Needless to say, things don’t work out like that.

Soon, strange things start to happen.  There’s a break-in at the house.  Despite her efforts to ignore him, Joshua still tries to talk his half-sister.  Jenna starts to throw biker-populated parties at the guest house.  Despite the fact that she claims to have no money, Jenna is able to buy her son an expensive jeep.  Allison comes to realize what we realized from the beginning: Jenna has sinister motives of her own!  The only question is whether or not Joshua shares those motives or if he’s just a pawn trapped in a game he didn’t intend to play.

A Killer In My Home is okay.  If I’m not as enthusiastic about it as I am about other Lifetime films, it’s because I never believed that Allison would 1) allow Jenna to stay in the guest house and 2) allow her to continue to stay in the guest house even after it became obvious that some seriously strange stuff was going on.  Allison lost my sympathy by doing that.  However, I did really like Krista Bridges’s performance as the unstable Jenna and I though Hannah Vandenbygaart gave a good and sympathetic performance as the daughter who is basically just sick of dealing with the adults in her life.  I could definitely relate.

Finally, the house was nice.  Lifetime movies always feature the nicest houses and A Killer In My Home featured one of the best!

Lifetime Film Review: Deadly Mile High Club (dir by Doug Campbell)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Last night, I watched the latest Lifetime premiere, Deadly Mile High Club!

Deadly Mile High Club tells the story of three people who end up flying the unfriendly skies together.  Tanya (Allison McAtee) is a flight instructor who has been haunted ever since the tragic crash that took the life of her lover and co-pilot.

Jake (Marc Herrmann) is the handsome guy who has a go-nowhere warehouse job where he works for his constantly critical mother-in-law, Margaret (Diane Robin).  Jake has decided to make some changes in his life, starting with learning how to fly.

And finally, Annie (Anna Marie Dobbins) is Jake’s wife.  They’ve been married for six years and, unfortunately, they’ve hit a rough patch.  Annie is busy going to school and Jake is constantly fighting with Annie’s mother.  When Jake tells Annie that she sounds just like her mother, Annie exiles him to the living room couch and good for her!  Annie likes to wear pink.  In particular, she likes to wear a pink hat, which is something that comes back to haunt both her and Jake later on in the movie.

Jake decides to hire Tanya to teach him how to fly.  This quickly turns out to be a mistake because, while Tanya is a good teacher, she’s also totally obsessed with Jake.  After Jake tells her that he and Annie had a fight the night before, Tanya flies him out to Palm Springs and suggests that they spend the night at a hotel.  Jake eventually turns her down but later on, during one of their lessons, Tanya has Jake fly over his house.  He looks down and he sees a strange man kissing a woman wearing a pink hat in the driveway.  Is Annie cheating on him!?

Realizing that things are just getting too strange, Jake attempts to switch over to a different flight instructor.  That flight instructor is named Gonzo (Damon K. Sperber) and he is, without a doubt, one of the greatest supporting characters to ever appear in a Lifetime movie.  Gonzo lives up to his name, dressing like an old World War II pilot and then doing dangerous stunts in an old school biplane while his employees — who are all wearing retro purple flight attendant uniforms — assure everyone watching that flying is safer than driving.  I won’t go into what happens to Gonzo but let’s just say that Tanya has a way of getting what she wants.

Anyway, Deadly Mile High Club is a lot of fun.  It’s one of those Lifetime films that fully embraces the melodrama and goes cheerfully over the top with a wink and a smile.  Tanya is the type of psycho who has no problem trying to trick someone into pushing their wife out of a plane and the entire cast appears to be having a ball with their crazed characters.  Allison McAtee especially does a great job as the unhinged Tanya and she delivers all of her lines with just the right amount of menace and humor.  Deadly Mile High Club is an entertaining film, one that takes the usual Lifetime tropes of the psycho stalker and the clueless husband and the loyal wife and which bring new life to them by putting them up in the sky.  It’s also a film that has a nicely self-aware sense of humor, which makes it all the more fun to watch.

Deadly Mile High Club was on last night and it will undoubtedly be on again so keep an eye out for it.  And definitely, keep watching the skies!

What Lisa Watched Last Night #211: Remember Me, Mommy? (dir by Michelle Ouellet)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Last night, I watched the premiere of one of the greatest Lifetime films of all time, Remember Me, Mommy?

Why Was I Watching It?

It was on Lifetime.  I’ve been ordered to shelter in place.  What else could I do?

Then again, even if I wasn’t on lockdown, I probably still would have watched it because this is one of those Lifetime films that takes place at a private school and features a teacher with a secret in her past and those are typically my favorite Lifetime films.  There’s just something irresistible about the mix of super snobs and dark secrets!

What Was It About?

Elena Walker (Sydney Meyer) is the newest student at Clark Academy!  She’s a scholarship student, which means that she has to deal with a lot of hazing from all of the rich kids.  It turns out that most of the students at Clark Academy have known each other for their entire lives so Elena is definitely an outsider.

However, fear not!  Elena loves to write and the school’s creative writing teacher, Rebecca (Natalie Brown), is a former scholarship student herself.  In fact, Rebecca is so impressed with Elena’s essays that she even arranges for Elena to meet with an Ivy League recruiter.  So …. yay for the scholarship students, I guess.

Except …. well, Elena may not be who she claims.  In fact, it turns out that Elena has a bad habit of killing people who get on her nerves.  It also turns out that it’s not just a coincidence that Elena showed up at Clark Academy and immediately went out of her way to bond with Rebecca.

What is Elena’s plan?  What is Rebecca’s secret?  I’m not going to spoil anything, especially since the title of the film already does that.

What Worked?

It all worked!

Seriously, this is one of the best Lifetime films that I’ve seen in a while.  Though you’ll probably guess Rebecca’s secret long before the film actually reveals it, Remember Me, Mommy? is still a lot of fun.  In the tradition of the best Lifetime films, Remember Me, Mommy? fully embraces the melodrama.  Elena never stops plotting, Rebecca never stops teaching, and the pace never slackens.

And I have to admit that, as evil as Elena was, it was hard not to like her.  She was an agent of chaos, dropped in the middle of a bunch of complacent snobs and she reacted by disrupting the status quo.  Of course, it would have been nice if she could have resisted the temptation to kill but still….

What Did Not Work?

It all worked!

“Oh my God!  Just like me!” Moments

Like Elena, I always got along with my creative writing teachers.  They were some of my favorite people.

At one point in the film, Elena is accused of plagiarism and I have to admit that brought back some memories of high school math class.  I’ve always sucked at math.  It’s just not my thing.  Fortunately, I had an older sister who had taken the class a year before me and who had saved all of her tests so, whenever I had to take a test, I would just copy all the answers and …. well, technically, I guess I was cheating.  My plan, if I was ever caught, was to argue that I wasn’t so much cheating as I was just plagiarizing my sister’s answers.  Fortunately, I never got caught so I didn’t actually have to find out whether or not that argument would have worked.

Lessons Learned

Be nice to scholarship students!

What Lisa Watched Last Night #210: A Mother Knows Worst (dir by Robert Malenfant)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Last night, I watched the latest Lifetime premiere, A Mother Knows Worst!

Why Was I Watching It?

Because it was on Lifetime!

Plus, I loved that title.  A Mother Knows Worst!  I’m seriously hoping that, once this lockdown ends, I’ll run into a really obnoxious woman who is carrying around a baby so that I can snap at her, “A mother knows worst!”

What Was It About?

Okay, so this is kind of a complicated movie and there’s no way for me to totally tell you what it was about without spoiling some of the film’s biggest twists.  So, I’ll just tell you what it pretends to be about while assuring you that there’s a few twists and turns that make this film a bit more interesting than you might think from just reading a rudimentary plot description:

Olivia (Kate Leclerc) and Brooke (Victoria Barabas) both gave birth on the same night.  According to the hospital, Olivia’s baby died while Brooke’s survived.  6 months later, Olivia’s husband, Harry (Jeff Schine), has a job working for Brooke’s husband, Glen (Todd Cahoon).  When Olivia sees Brooke’s daughter, she says that she felt an instant connection to the baby, a connection that Brooke feels that she has yet to establish.  While Brooke is happy with the idea of Olivia helping to look after her daughter, both Harry and Glen are concerned that Olivia may be forming an unhealthy obsession with Brooke’s daughter.

Meanwhile, there’s a murderer on the loose and….

Well, that’s all I can really tell you.  I know it sounds like a typical Lifetime baby kidnapping film but you’ll just have to take my word for it that it’s actually a bit more complicated than that.

What Worked?

This film was full of twists and turns!  Seriously, I love Lifetime film but it’s rare that they take me by surprise.  In fact, one of the appeals of the movies they show on Lifetime is that they tend to be predictable.  A Mother Knows Worst, however, had some pretty effective surprises and it definitely kept you guessing as to who could be trusted and who should be feared.

Katie Leclerc and Jeff Schine both did a great job playing Olivia and Harry.  In fact, the whole film was pretty well-acted.  Everyone did a good job of keeping the viewers off-balance.

I loved Brooke and Glen’s house!  That pool was to die for.

What Did Not Work?

Unfortunately, towards the end of the film, there’s a lot of flashbacks and they tend to kind of bog down the film’s finale.  Though it’s a cliche, sometimes it’s best to just have the villain give a monologue explaining all of their evil deeds, especially when the other option is stopping all the action for a lengthy flashback.

“Oh my God!  Just like me!” Moments

Olivia had red hair just like me so, of course, I totally related to her and was on her side.  It’s a scary world out there and those of us blessed with the best hair color in the world have to stick together.

Lessons Learned

Take nothing for granted, not even the plot of the latest Lifetime film.

What Lisa Watched Last Night #209: Revenge For Daddy (dir by Tom Shell)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Last night, I watched the latest Lifetime premiere, Revenge for Daddy!

Why Was I Watching It?

Well, first off, you may not have heard but the entire world is kind of shut down right now so basically, watching TV is about as wild as my Thursday night is going to get….

Then again, I would have watched it even if we weren’t on lockdown.  It’s a new Lifetime movie and you know that I love those!  I especially love Lifetime movies that have words like “Fatal,” “Wrong,” or “Revenge” in the title.  Those are usually the best.

What Was It About?

It’s been a tough year for Lisa (Sarah Butler).  Her father died under mysterious circumstances.  Her boyfriend, Bobby (Charlie Gorilla), got drunk and slept with one her co-workers, Bethany (Eva Hamilton), leaving Lisa suddenly single.  Her mother (Joely Fisher) keeps pressuring her to start dating again.  Finally, just to keep her mom happy, Lisa photoshops herself into a picture with a handsome man on a dating site.  All she wants to do is send it to her mom so her mom will get off her back.  Instead, it leads to the man in the picture, Michael (Clayton James), tracking her down.  Soon, Lisa and Michael are dating for real!

But can Michael be trusted?  It turns out that Michael has a somewhat shady past which includes at least one mysterious death.  Michael says he’s innocent but when one of Lisa’s co-workers shows up dead (and, even worse, when it appears that someone is trying to frame Lisa for the murder), Lisa starts to have her doubts….

What Worked?

This one was fun.  I mean, let’s be honest.  When it comes to most Lifetime melodramas, you’re not exactly looking for a realistic examination of all the world’s troubles.  You’re looking for twists and turns and melodrama, preferably taking place in a nice house where everyone is either handsome or pretty and everyone wears nice clothes.  Revenge For Daddy delivered all of that with the style.

The cast was uniformly good and the film actually did a pretty good job of keeping you guessing as to whether or not Michael was who he said he was.  The film even managed to work in a few moments of intentional humor in the middle of all the drama and the mystery.  All in all, this was one an enjoyable and entertaining Lifetime film.

I really liked the office where Lisa and her friends worked.  It was nicely designed and, even more importantly, it didn’t seem like anyone really had to do much work.  It seems like it would be a fun place from which to collect a paycheck.

What Didn’t Work?

It all worked!  To repeat, this was an enjoyable and entertaining Lifetime film.

“Oh my God!  Just like me!” Moments

The main character was named Lisa!  You don’t get much more like me than that.

Lessons Learned

There were definitely lessons learned but I can’t really share them without spoiling the film’s ending.  So, you’ll have to watch and learn for yourself!

What Lisa Watched Last Night #208: Into The Arms Of Danger (dir by Jeff Hare)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Last night, I watched the latest Lifetime premiere, Into the Arms of Danger!

Why Was I Watching?

The obvious answer is that I was watching it because it was on Lifetime.  However, I was also watching because I absolutely loved the title.  Into the Arms of Danger is just so wonderfully overdramatic that there was no way I could resist it.

What Was It About?

Basically, it’s a Lifetime version of the classic 1980 grindhouse film, Mother’s Day.  Two weird brothers pretend to be EMTs and kidnap young women, forcing them to go home and pretend to be a member of their family.  They do it all to keep their crazy mother (Cathy Moriarty) happy.

In this film, their latest victim is Jenny (AlexAnn Hopkins), who is kidnapped after she wrecks her car and makes the mistake of calling 911.  (The brothers basically intercept 911 calls, which was kind of weird.)  Jenny just wanted to go to college and get away from her overprotective mother, Laura (Laurie Fortier).  Instead, she’s now being held prisoner and is forced to wear an explosive ankle bracelet.  It kind of sucks.

Laura knows that her daughter has been kidnapped but she can’t get the police to take her seriously.  They think that Jenny has either just run away or maybe she’s gotten involved with drugs.  Either way, they’re attitude is, “Don’t bother us with their domestic problems.”  So, it’s up to Laura to figure out what has happened to her daughter and to rescue her from the …. ARMS OF DANGER!

What Worked?

AlexAnn Hopkins and Laurie Fortier were believable as mother and daughter.  You believed that they not only cared about each other but that they also frequently got annoyed with each other.  That’s the secret to realistically portraying a mother/daughter relationship on film.  You have to capture both the love and the annoyance.

Cathy Moriarty gave a good performance as the demented mother.  For film buffs, Moriarty is a bit of a legendary figure.  She made her film debut in Raging Bull and received an Oscar nomination. She was incredible in Raging Bull and still is a great actress.  Unfortunately, shortly after making her debut, Moriarty was in a serious car accident and spent several years recovering.  As a result, when she returned to films, she rarely got the type of huge roles that she undoubtedly deserved.  She’s still one of those actresses who, when you see her name in the credits, you know that she’s going to give a good performance.

In fact, the whole crazy family dynamic was well-done.  They reminded me a bit of the family from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, just with less blood and cannibalism.

What Did Not Work?

Usually, I can suspend my disbelief when it comes to Lifetime films.  I mean, we don’t watch these films because we’re expecting them to be a 100% realistic.  But the whole thing with the brothers pretending to be EMTs was just a bit too much for me to buy.

“Oh my God!  Just like me!” Moments

More like, “Oh my God!  Just like my mom!” moments.  As soon as Laura jumped in her car and drove all the way out to a party just to keep Jenny from accepting help from a strange boy, I was like, “Oh my God, I know just how Jenny feels!”  Myself, I would always very dramatically roll my eyes and go, “Mom!” whenever stuff like that happened.  Looking back, my mom was usually right, though.

Lessons Learned

If you wreck your car, never call 911.