Shattered Innocence

I saw this on the True Romance channel today and thought it was not bad at all, typical of the Made-for-TV movies of the 80s. Joanna Lee plays the part of Pamela Lee, a porn actress who killed herself at the age of 20 after heavy cocaine addiction with her young life filled with misfortunes. Like many, she came from the rural midwest and was attracted to the bright lights of LA hoping to make it as a legit model only to pose nude and end up in porn. It is really a sad and moving story, well directed and acted. Joanna Lee does an excellent job of portraying this poor young girl. Ms. Lee made only a few pictures

This CBS-TV movie begins like most others in the good-girl-goes-bad vein, but it quickly becomes apparent that "Shattered Innocence" is well-made, well-acted and written--it catches you off-guard. The young woman whose innocence is shattered is based on real-life '80s porn-star Shauna Grant. Scenes such as the one where "Lara Dawn" goes back home to Kansas for Christmas, proudly showing off a scrapbook of nude photos to her family and then getting rebuffed by her appalled mother, are both tender and sad, and the young woman's fight to reclaim her life at the finale is quite moving. The film doesn't have the theatrical style of something like "Star 80", but it's thoughtful and touching in its own way thanks in large part to a solid cast and to Sandor Stern's tight direction and script, co-written with Thanet Richard. A nice surprise. *** from ****

Based loosely on the life story of porn superstar Shauna Grant/Colleen Applegate. For a made for TV movie, it wasn't bad. For those really interested in Shauna Grant's decline to eventual suicide this movie treats the matter very superficially. Although accurate in its simplicity, it tends to trivialize the adult business; a business which frankly needs no trivialization. Rumor had it that Shauna Grants family weren't too pleased about the movie.......despite the fact that they co-operated and were compensated by the production company. The movie portrayed them as real straightlaced simpletons, incapable or unwilling to deal with anything outside their "small town" existence. The plot continually amplified this and we were left to conclude that this lack of unconditional love and understanding was the main reason for Shauna's suicide. Jonna Lee, which was "very watchable" throughout, does a good job of portraying Grant. All in all, I would rate it a 3*** out of 5.

This 1988 made for t.v. movie was based on the life and ultimate suicide of Colleen Applegate, a young woman from Minnesota who went to Hollywood at the age of 18 with dreams of stardom, became a porn star under the name of "Shauna Grant" and then returned to her hometown two years later to be buried, a tragic suicide at the age of 20.

This movie is a fictionalized account of her life and death although apparently her parents did cooperate in the making of this film.

Jonna Lee portrays "Pauline Anderson", the fictionalized version of Colleen. She overacts at times, but otherwise does a competent job of portraying the innocence and then gradual freefall of a young girl who gets ensnared into the adult entertainment industry through cocaine and big money. Melinda Dillon portrays her mother, and does a good job of conveying her character's devastation and shame at her daughter's choice of career, and eventual destruction.

I think what gave this movie more poignancy to me was the fact that it was based on a true story, not just some hack writer's imagination working overtime. How many thousands of young girls go to Hollywood each year with the hopes of breaking into the movies, only to fall into porn, with devastating results? It's a chilling thought, and Colleen's suicide is a reminder of this.

This is a movie that could have been tawdry and exploitative, and indeed, I recall reading that the parents of Colleen Applegate (whose life this is loosely based on) were displeased with it, saying it made the pornographers look like they were just running a business and Colleen got into trouble on her own. It's not quite that simple in the movie.

The acting is good all around. Jonna Lee is convincing in all three wildly different stages of the Colleen character's (here she's called Pauleen) story: naive virgin, confident nude model, and decimated, has-been, weary porn star. Her hysterical, desperate tirade at the end is particularly noteworthy; despite the many stupid decisions she's made, in the end, you feel for her. She was really just a kid, after all.