A Kidnapping in the Family

Seeing this film was purely by chance. I was working at home on the computer, and someone was watching it in the next room. I had taken a break for lunch a bit after it had started.

Some movies are mediocre, but you watch sometimes if you haven't anything better to do, or are just vegging-out for a couple of hours. Some are "so bad that they're good," and provide amusement instead of the type of appreciation which the maker may have intended.

Then there are those like this one, which occur not too frequently, but with regularity among this channel and genre.

Even while delivering a topic and subject matter which could be treated to evoke some feeling and meaning for viewers - this production, its characters, and perhaps most of all, the performances - present absolutely nothing of value.

There wasn't a single performance or character which was the least bit sympathetic, and all were vacuous and completely uninteresting in their own ways. Their performances were wooden, and I found it impossible to care about or like the characters meant to be liked and sympathetic; it was equally impossible to be interested sufficiently in the negative characters, or to dislike or care one iota about them either.

Grandmother/mother/father/sister/good guy-new husband - all were big zeroes in terms of what one hopes to find (even minimally) in a story.

too many problems with the way this story was presented; it is hard to believe it was based on truth, and even more difficult to develop empathy for Tracey Gold's character, and the Kate Jackson character, as evil Mom accusing her daughter of satanic rituals is way too over the top to be believable.

Lifetime movies can work if they have a message, a true story which is concisely presented, or something which the audience has experienced, and may relate to, or learn from. This falls into none of those categories. Kate Jackson, a decent TV actress, can usually save the film (she was in a film with Chad Allen, where he is an ex-con, and she actually made the movie watchable). Not so in this case, do not waste your time.

(Note: Over 500 of my movie reviews are now available in my book "Cut to the Chaise Lounge or I Can't Believe I Swallowed the Remote!" Get it at Amazon.)

This ABC "Original," "based on actual events," the kind behind the mail flyers showing the missing child "last seen with" and "age progression by...," might be subtitled, "Grunge Girl versus Batso Mom." When Grandmother Dede, sporting a sadistic smile, played with witch-like frigidity by Kate Jackson, can't have absolute control over her grandchild and slightly slutty daughter, Sarah, played by Tracy Gold, she drums up some satanic child abuse accusations against the leather-wearing, cigarette-smoking, bar-hopping ingrate. When that fails, Batso Mom escalates...

Subplot: Sarah meets handsome, long-haired hunk Jack at art class. This guy is so good he might be called "the saint who loves you." But Sarah disses him a little, and when he proves to be a good puppy dog, she throws him a little sex, and in the morning taunts him with the marriage question. He surprises by saying he thinks that would be okay. She never pretends to love him, but after he works seventy hours a week and buys the big house and puts up with her insensitive behavior and gets her pregnant, she learns to love him. Not only that, but she loses the leather and no longer waves a cigarette around. For unexplained reasons, it is Grandma Dede who sucks on the weed in the final reel.

This is no work of art, but more important in a MOW than artistic integrity or even artistic cleverness is how the movie plays according to the current politically-correct wisdom. Since most child-nappings are known to be by family members, this fits; and since virtually all "satanic abuse" charges are patently false, they got that right too. What they didn't get right is the casting and the sets. Everybody is too pretty to be real, and Sarah's apartment and then her house are like middle American dream homes when in reality they should reflect her low-rent, high school dropout, no-housework-for-me persona.

Saw this on LMN, and have to say, this is the movie that got me hooked on the channel. I actually have relatives who suffered a kidnapping in the family, so the plot really struck a chord with me. The acting is unbelievably good, except for the little boy, who seemed a little wooden. Perhaps this was his first movie, but the kid hired to play him was more convincing than he was. Actually, this movie's main plot was fairly straightforward, but the subplot of the mother and her husband married for looks was what had me bawling. There are so many ugly little truths to the story, poignant, but resolved before the end. This movie is a must see, if you can catch it!

This story is very true to life. Children are being kidnapped daily from decent families with the help of child services.

Replacing the grandma with a foster woman, this story depicts what happened to our family. The foster woman used child services to steal my two grandkids from a good, loving father.

This movie needs to be aired more often. There is a movement in this country to expose what this movie portrays.

There are many people in this country with their own, greedy agendas. This movie was very believable to me because my family is living it. No one really understands until it happens to them.

I commend all involved in making this movie!