Lifestories: Families in Crisis

"A Child Betrayed" changed my life. I know a lot of people who have had this experience. The movie was really realistic and the acting was so good I couldn't tear myself away. I especially liked the supporting cast (some child actors who really were phenomenal). The kid who played Kenny was the best. I think that the story is an important one to tell. I know this movie won some Emmys. It totally deserves them! The movie was touching. I recommend it to anyone interested in religion, acting, or kids. Not only did the movie report accurate events, but it did so in a really emotional way. Some shots were in-your-face intense. There is this one where the kid Kenny feels really sad because his friend is going to get molested, and there's this close up on him and he's really a good actor so it seems totally realistic. Everyone should see this movie!

I have been having a hard time finding info on this series. I saw a episode from this series on HBO one day that was part of this "Lifestories" compilation. It was good and very realistic. The story I saw was a true story-after it aired there was a brief commentary by the actual date-rape victim. I believe Ali Larter played the victim. Anyways she was good and I was impressed on how real-life she made that role seem. Anyways I am curious to see the rest of the shows in this series.

I saw the episode about the bulimic girl, played by Calista Flockhart, in health class. It provided a visceral, graphic look into eating disorders and stayed with me a while. The whole vomit-in-the-closet thing was disgusting. The movie overall showed the horrifying reality of bulimia in an excellent way.

The film in which Calista Flockhart plays a young woman with an eating disorder was well-made I thought. But through no fault of the film or it's creators this film had some negative results. I'm sure the people who made the movie wanted to discourage young girls like myself from ever developing an eating disorder. Unfortunately this film taught me how to have an eating disorder, at least I used it as a place to get tips because it really goes into great detail about this girls methods of fasting and purging. I would write it off as a fluke but I recently learned that Christina Ricci reacted the same way to this film. So, despite the quality and intentions of this movie, if you are a young impressionable girl or boy, or the parent of one this may be a movie you should skip. There are probably other people who found this to be triggering and you don't want to become one of them.

I have seen all of the episodes of this series, but the one that sticks out the most is with Sam Rockwell. He plays a drunk driver who kills a young woman in a car accident. His punishment is to write a check FOR $1 every month and send it to the parents. It is a very strong story with an invaluable lesson about how precious life is, and how so many lives are ruined with one irresponsible mistake. This whole series was very moving because after the short story, the main character of the story, or that person's family spoke about how the story effected their lives. More raw and real than the after-school special,I saw it when I was 12, and I still remember it at 24. A very good series, indeed.