Desperate Rescue: The Cathy Mahone Story

Flicked to this TV movie just as it was starting and was "hooked" within seconds. Looked like it would be a dumb and "cheesy" TV movie, but ended up being treated to a thoughtful, tense drama of real life story about a woman's ex-husband (an American-Arab) who kid-naps his daughter (whom he has visitation rights to) and smuggles her out of America and back to his home country in the middle-east. With no money and no more official options (aka. the Government), the mother, Cathy Mahone (solid, convincing performance by Muriel Hemingway), unofficially "hires" 3 ex-military men to go and kidnap her daughter back. This story is finger gripping tension from beginning to end. Their solution to get this little American girl back is not your typical car chase and shoot off a lot of guns action. They have to think and maneuver their way through the problem and culture of several Arab countries and past the ever watchful eyes of the father's very large Jordanian family in order to retrieve this little American girl and reunite her with her mother. I owned it on video for many years and as with any good story, I watched it again and again, finding something MORE in it each time. Great acting by the entire cast. Especially Clancy Brown, James Russo and Jeff Kober who portray the 3 men who decide to help Cathy retrieve her daughter, even though they will actually lose a lot of money to take on this "job".