The Eric Roberts Collection: If I Can’t Have You (dir by David DeCoteau)

Posted on April 5, 2026 by Lisa Marie Bowman

In 2023’s If I Can’t Have You, Michelle (Bailey Kai) is the host of the hottest late night radio show in town but she’s been getting creepy phone calls from someone identifying himself as Curtis. Michelle and her producer (Gina Haraizumi) can’t get get any help from the cops (played by Jackee Harry and Tracy Nelson) so they decide to investigate on their own.

Who is Michelle’s stalker? Could it be the creepy guy (Michael Pare) who lives next door? Could it be their geeky engineer, Keith (Phillip McElroy)? Could it be Stan (Eric Roberts), the owner of the radio station who seems to be really determined to get them to change their time slot? Or could it be just some other random guy with too much time on his hands?

To give credit where credit is due, director David DeCoteau does manage to generate some suspense as to who the stalker actually is. I wouldn’t say I was exactly shocked when the stalker’s identity was revealed but DeCoteau still did a good job of giving us plenty of suspects to consider. That said, this is still a David DeCoteau film and the real pleasure of the film is spotting all of the standard DeCoteauisms. In this case, Joe’s Restaurant — previously seen in The Wrong Mr. Right — makes a return appearance.

In the end, this one isn’t as much fun as DeCoteau’s “Wrong” films. There’s no Vivica A. Fox saying, “Looks like you suspected the Wrong Stalker.” Still, it’s entertaining enough and Eric Roberts appears to have been in a good mood during filming.

Previous Eric Roberts Films That We Have Reviewed:

The Eric Roberts Collection: The Wrong Teacher (dir by David DeCoteau)

Posted on March 31, 2026 by Lisa Marie Bowman

When Charlotte (Jessica Morris) meets a younger man named Chris (Philip McElroy), she is both flattered and amused when he asks her out. “You’re a little young for me,” Charlotte says. However, Charlotte’s friend, Maddie (Akari Endo), insists that Charlotte really does need to get out more so Charlotte meets up with Chris for drinks. One things leads to another and soon, Charlotte is having sex with Chris in her classroom!

(Charlotte is an English teacher, along with being a struggling romance novelist.)

The next day, as Charlotte teachers her class, she is shocked when Chris shows up. “What are you doing here?” Charlotte asks. Chris reveals that he’s a new student and Charlotte is now his English teacher!

2018’s The Wrong Teacher is one of the many “Wrong” films that David DeCoteau directed for Lifetime. This one follows the usual pattern. Chris isn’t ready to let go of his one night of passion with the teacher. When he discovers that Charlotte is getting back together with her ex-boyfriend (Jason-Shane Scott), he snaps. Soon, people are getting shot and hit with baseball bats and videos of Chris and Charlotte going at it in the classroom are showing up on the school’s twitter page. Vivica A. Fox is alarmed that Charlotte could be so foolish. Charlotte declares, “You messed with the wrong teacher!” Thanks to some last minute strangeness that sees Charlotte adopting a Southern accent, The Wrong Teacher is enjoyably over the top.

As for Eric Roberts, he plays the assistant principal. He’s a bit burned-out. He’s easily annoyed. He doesn’t want any scandalous behavior in his school. He’s Eric Roberts and he makes the most of his three scenes. Eric even stands up and walks in this movie. He only does that when he’s particularly invested in a role. The Wrong Teacher? More like The Right Vice Principal.

Previous Eric Roberts Films That We Have Reviewed:

Lifetime Film Review: Killer Competition (dir by Andrew Lawrence)

Posted on November 26, 2020 by Lisa Marie Bowman

I was not valedictorian of my high school.

I’ve always thought that was a bit unfair, to be honest. I mean, I was clearly the smartest person in my graduating class but my grades didn’t always reflect that. Now, admittedly, I went through some stuff in the 9th and the 10th grades and basically, I was like a C student for those two years but that wasn’t really my fault. I just wasn’t trying. All of my teachers told me that I would be their top student if I would just do my homework and maybe study for a test or two. My grades improved during my junior year of high school. If it was an English or a history class, I never got anything less than an A. I got A’s in all of my electives. It was the math and the science classes that would drag me down. I never cared about either subject and, to be honest, I probably would have never gotten a passing grade in any of my math classes if not for the fact that my sister was a year ahead of me and she saved all of her tests. I’m not saying that cheating was the right thing to do but …. well, I guess I am saying that. But anyway, my point is that it was a little but unfair to make me take all of those math and science classes because those just weren’t my thing and, if not for them and if my grades from the 9th and the 10th grade hadn’t been factored into the equation, I would have had a 4.0+ and I could have given the greatest graduation speech in history.

That said, I pretty much knew that I wasn’t going to be anywhere near the top ten of my high school graduating class and I was okay with that. I wasn’t planning on going to an Ivy League school. To be honest, for most of high school, I wasn’t even planning on going to college. I was going to take a leap year or two and go to Europe. (My mom compromised and allowed me to go to Europe for the summer on the condition that I go to college in the fall.) For the most part, I think I had a pretty good attitude about things.

Unfortunately, the characters in Killer Competition do not have a similar attitude. Nicole (Jacqueline Scislowski) is obsessed with becoming valedictorian so that she can get into her dream college. Complicating things is that super smart Victor (Philip McElroy) has applied to the same school and apparently, only 300 students are accepted and it’s rare that the college ever accepts two students from the same high school. If Nicole is going to go to a good college and end up with a crippling amount of debt, she’s going to have to prevent Victor from becoming valedictorian. But how!? Nicole’s friend Sarah (Cristine Prosperi) suggests that Nicole break into the school and substitute Victor’s A test paper with a B test paper. It’s always good to have a friend like Sarah! Anyway, needless to say, that is all leads to secrets, lies, and murder. It’s a Lifetime film.

I really liked Killer Competition. It embraces the melodrama and, most importantly, it seems to be in on the joke. Killer Competition doesn’t waste any time going over the top as Nicole and Sarah somehow manage to pull off one of the most absurdly complicated schemes in the history of high school. Cristine Prosperi, who you may recognize from Degrassi, has a lot of fun with the role of Sarah, playing her as a cheerful force of chaos and destruction. Killer Competition is a lot of fun and definitely one to watch the next time you’re wondering how far you would go to get into Harvard or Yale.