Tag Archives: Todd Lasance

Insomnia File #59: True Spirit (dir by Sarah Spillane)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

What’s an Insomnia File? You know how some times you just can’t get any sleep and, at about three in the morning, you’ll find yourself watching whatever you can find on cable or Netflix? This feature is all about those insomnia-inspired discoveries!

If you were having trouble getting to sleep last night (or this night, for that matter), you could have turned over to Netflix and passed the time watching True Spirit, a rather wholesome biopic from Australia.

Teagan Croft stars as Jessica Watson, who, at the age of 16, became the youngest person ever to sail solo, non-stop around the world.  For Jessica, it was not only the fulfilment of a childhood dream but it was also a true test of survival as, towards the end of her journey, she got trapped in a very violent storm and, at one point, her boat was actually 15 feet below the surface of the ocean.  For the nation of Australia, it was a moment of great pride despite the fact that many of the same people who celebrated Jessica’s accomplishment had earlier tried to prevent her from making the journey.  (Indeed, the film suggests that one reason why Jessica was in such a hurry to start her voyage was because the Queensland legislature was literally putting together a bill that, once passed, would have made it illegal for her to do so.)  The film begins with Jessica already in training for her voyage.  One mistake during a trial run leads to her boat nearly crashing into a tanker, a reminder that, as beautiful as the ocean may be, it can still be a dangerous place.  With the help of Ben Bryant (Cliff Curtis) and the support her parents (Anna Paquin and Josh Lawson), Jessica is determined to make her voyage.  She not only wants to set a world record but she also wants to prove that, even though she’s dyslexic, she can still accomplish anything that she sets her mind too.

There’s really nothing that surprising to be found in True Spirit.  Even if you didn’t already know the true story on which the film was based, you wouldn’t be surprised by how Jessica’s voyage goes.  But, at the same time, it’s a well-intentioned and almost achingly sincere film, one that celebrates a worthy accomplishment and which features a likable lead performance from Teagan Croft.  It’s a film that is determined to focus on the positive, though it certainly doesn’t shy away from the fact that nature can be frightening and unpredictable.  There’s nothing particularly edgy about True Spirit.  Despite a nicely executed storm scene, this isn’t All is Lost.  But it will hold your attention and it’ll probably leave you in a good mood.  It did for me!

Finally, I can’t complete this review without mentioning that Todd Lasance plays a rather obnoxious television journalist named Atherton.  Would it be too much to hope that his name was meant to be a reference to William Atherton, who played a similar reporter in the first two Die Hards?

Previous Insomnia Files:

  1. Story of Mankind
  2. Stag
  3. Love Is A Gun
  4. Nina Takes A Lover
  5. Black Ice
  6. Frogs For Snakes
  7. Fair Game
  8. From The Hip
  9. Born Killers
  10. Eye For An Eye
  11. Summer Catch
  12. Beyond the Law
  13. Spring Broke
  14. Promise
  15. George Wallace
  16. Kill The Messenger
  17. The Suburbans
  18. Only The Strong
  19. Great Expectations
  20. Casual Sex?
  21. Truth
  22. Insomina
  23. Death Do Us Part
  24. A Star is Born
  25. The Winning Season
  26. Rabbit Run
  27. Remember My Name
  28. The Arrangement
  29. Day of the Animals
  30. Still of The Night
  31. Arsenal
  32. Smooth Talk
  33. The Comedian
  34. The Minus Man
  35. Donnie Brasco
  36. Punchline
  37. Evita
  38. Six: The Mark Unleashed
  39. Disclosure
  40. The Spanish Prisoner
  41. Elektra
  42. Revenge
  43. Legend
  44. Cat Run
  45. The Pyramid
  46. Enter the Ninja
  47. Downhill
  48. Malice
  49. Mystery Date
  50. Zola
  51. Ira & Abby
  52. The Next Karate Kid
  53. A Nightmare on Drug Street
  54. Jud
  55. FTA
  56. Exterminators of the Year 3000
  57. Boris Karloff: The Man Behind The Monster
  58. The Haunting of Helen Walker

Lifetime Film Review: Kidnapped in Paradise (dir by Vic Sarin)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

It seemed like it should have been the perfect vacation.

Savannah (Claire van der Boom), her husband Brad (Todd Lasance), and their daughter Aria (Molly Wright) travel to an island resort off the coast of Australia.  It’s the resort that Savannah used to vacation at when she was a child and this is a chance for her to not only get in touch with her past but to also show her family a good time.

And, at first, everything seems perfect.  The island is beautiful.  The people working at the resort are friendly.  There’s a nice and attractive couple staying in the cabin next door.  Even more importantly, there’s Kidz Club, where Savannah and Brad can drop off Aria so that they can have some alone time.  Seriously, that may be the best thing about the resort because there are just times when the adults need some time to themselves.  Aria and her stuffed bunny, Mr. Pickles, are dropped off.  Unfortunately, when Savannah returns to Kidz Club to pick up her daughter, Aria is nowhere to be found.

Has Aria wandered off?  Has she gotten lost on the beach?  Has something worse happened?  Soon, everyone on the island is searching for Aria.  Mr. Pickles is found but where’s Aria?  When someone sends Savannah a picture of Aria looking happy and drawing, Savannah realizes that her daughter didn’t just wander off.  She’s been kidnapped!  Kidnapped in paradise!

For all of their trademark melodrama, the best Lifetime films deal with very real fears.  Discovering that your lover is cheating on you or that your in-laws so disapproves of you that they’re willing to go to any length to either prevent or destroy your marriage, these are very real fears for a lot of people.  For a parent, there’s no greater fear than losing a child and/or not knowing where your child is.  I mean, I may not be a parent but I am an aunt and I once lost track of my niece at the Dallas Arboretum and it was like the most terrifying 8 hours of my life.  (Actually, it was only 15 minutes but it felt like 8 hours.  Not only was I scared that I’d never see my niece again but I was also terrified of what her mother would do when she found out.  Fortunately, it turned out that my niece had just run ahead of me to another exhibit but still, I was on the verge of having a heart attack by the time I saw her running up to me.)

Kidnapped in Paradise captures that fear of losing a child and the feeling of powerlessness that goes along with it.  From the minute that Aria disappears, Savannah is searching for her and demanding that others search for her as well.  Claire van der Broom did a good job of portraying Savannah’s desperation and her anger that the resort didn’t do a better job of keeping track of her daughter.  What I liked is that whenever anyone else started tries to make excuses or started to talk about their own problems, Savannah was like, “Shut up and find my daughter.”

At the same time, as bad as I felt for Savannah, I was happy that her child was kidnapped in paradise as opposed to being kidnapped on a less photogenic island.  Seriously, the resort looked really nice and I totally want to stay there, despite the area’s history of abductions.  I mean, once you take the whole kidnapping thing out of the equation, it really was an nice place to work on your tan and take romantic walks on the beach.

My point is that the film delivered exactly what the title promised, which is perhaps the highest praise that you can give to most films.  There was a kidnapping and there was paradise.  The plot held my attention while the resort held my imagination.  It was a good combination.

The combination of The Wrong Real Estate Agent and Kidnapped in Paradise gets Lifetime off to a good start for 2021.