The Haunting of Lisa

Cheryl Ladd stars as Ellen, whose young daughter Lisa experiences spectral visions (aka: she sees dead people!). Lisa sees a beckoning spirit, just as the body of a little girl is found.

When Ellen makes a gruesome discovery that's vital to the case, she's besieged by reporters and religious nuts. Lisa's visions continue, while the police investigate the tragic mystery.

THE HAUNTING OF LISA is an above average made-for-TV supernatural-thriller. While not overly terrifying, it does have a certain creep-factor going on. Ms. Ladd is quite convincing in her harried role, and her fans will love her in this...

The title of this movie is a bit of a misnomer. This isn't really about a haunting, at least not as I understand the word. It is, however, a passable suspense flick about a young girl (Lisa, well played by young Aemelia Robinson) who receives mysterious visions about the murder of a young child, and whose visions set in motion a search for the killer, who may also be responsible for other deaths and who may now need to kill Lisa to avoid being caught.

The identity of the killer is well kept as an open question for most of the movie. You eventually reach the point at which you can narrow it down to two suspects, but you aren't really sure who it is until it's revealed.

Cheryl Ladd put on a decent enough performance as Lisa's mom, Ellen, who shares her daughter's psychic-like powers. Criticisms? Well, the movie caricatures both TV reporters and the Catholic Church a little bit. Even given the aggressiveness of the media, I don't think they'd film a private conversation between a mother and her young daughter and play the tape on television, and I honestly don't believe that a Catholic priest (Father Eakin, played by Don Allison) would intrude on a family with no connection to his church and who are not even Catholic.

As I said to begin, this is passable - nothing more, really.

5/10

This was quite a bit better than I was expecting. I watched it because it featured Cheryl Ladd who I am a fan of from watching Charlie's Angels. She is wonderful in this. It's not like quite a lot of the TV Movies, a American family drama, sometimes with other actresses from Charlie's Angels. It is quite a lot different. It kept me interested right up till the end, trying to find out who the person now after Lisa really is. A better TV Movie with great acting from all really.

Not exactly recommendable for die-hard horror fans, since the film offers a tame mixture of drama & thriller, with only the added supernatural element occasionally venturing into horror territory. Little Lisa (Aemilia Robinson) has, just like her mother Ellen Downey (Cheryl Ladd), psychic abilities. We're talking communication with the dead here. Her contacts with the other side will lead the good guys onto the trail of a very bad serial killer. Performances aren't too bad, but the whole film is just unremarkable, boosted by some very cheap special (editing) effects. A by-the-numbers supernatural-tinted affair for bored housewives from the nineties as its target audience.

In Haven Lake, Michigan, five years after her father Tom died, 9-year-old Lisa Downey is taken to the park by her mother Ellen. While Lisa is at the park, a groundskeeper makes a horrifying discovery--the body of a child.

Meanwhile, Lisa hears the voice of a woman who seems to be calling for help. She goes to a shed. (At this point, if you get dizzy on a merry-go-round, you are advised not to watch.) Eventually, a beautiful, angelic woman appears, with the most pleasant voice, advising Lisa that the killer needs to be found before there are more deaths.

Ellen works in the same building with Mitch, the chief of police, who she is marrying in several weeks. When she hears about the body, she is naturally upset because she doesn't realize the body has been there awhile.

Lisa tells the story of her vision to her mother. Unfortunately, a nosy TV reporter is right there with his camera to record the whole thing, and soon Lisa and her mother are celebrities with cameras and fans camped outside.

Father Edward Eakin feels the need to offer his help. Ellen and Lisa are not that religious, but Ellen reluctantly accepts.

Another body is found in the shed where Lisa saw the vision. The investigation of the murders begins.

Lisa continues to have visions. Scary ones. In one, a little boy named Buddy is upset that his mother is remarrying. His sister taunts him, and Buddy gets angry enough to kill. This vision appears fuzzy, with sound that seems to be coming from a distance. And it advances forward every few seconds, sort of like a camera I used to see at Radio Shack, where I would see myself in one location and then a few feet away several seconds later--I wasn't moving. A really eerie effect.

The climactic scenes just before the ending offer quite a bit of excitement, and we are kept guessing about what will happen and who the killer is.

Aemilia Robinson has quite a challenge here as Lisa, and she meets it very nicely. Corey Sevier is genuinely terrifying as Buddy.

I wouldn't recommend this for kids, even though it is primarily about Lisa and her abilities. The visions, even in the shed, are quite scary. Most of the time, though, the movie isn't so bad.

It's a standard TV-movie mystery, but the young actors make it just a little more.