The Wrong Mother

After "Girl Followed" Lifetime aired a much-hyped "premiere" that was considerably better: "The Wrong Mother," also known as "Deadly Devotion," which once again tapped the "perfect nanny" trope Lifetime has been using at least since Christine Conradt wrote the script for "The Perfect Nanny" in 2000, thereby launching her career at the network. This one, directed by Craig Goldstein from a script by Missy Cox, begins with Kaylene Larson (Vanessa Marcil) being struck by a car coming up from behind her as she rides outdoors on her bicycle. She survives but she ends up with a bad concussion, and even when the hospital releases her they want her to have home care, so she hires one of the nurses who was taking care of her to be her in-home caregiver. Alas, the in-home caregiver, Vanessa Renzi (Brooke Nevin), puts Kaylene on highly powerful opiates (getting three doctors to split the task of writing all those prescriptions) that leave her sleeping half the day and being totally groggy the rest, to the point where she can't even read a bedtime story to her children Zoey (Arden Richardson) and Toby (Cooper Dodson) without stumbling over simple words. In case you're wondering where Kaylene's husband is in all of this, his name is Drew, he's played by Stephen Snedden (your typical tall, lanky, sandy-haired type that's the good guy in a Lifetime movie — he's considerably less sexy than Joey Lawrence in "Girl Followed"!) and he works as a commercial airline pilot, so he's almost never home and that leaves Kaylene at the untender mercies of Vanessa.

In what's become a pretty typical part of the Lifetime formula, we learn that Vanessa has already drawn blood before she enters the main action and that she's the biological mother of Kaylene's children: Kaylene had her kids via in vitro fertilization from her husband's sperm and donated eggs, and Vanessa was her egg donor. Vanessa learned this by seducing a young man in charge of the database at the fertility clinic where she made the donation years before, only in the film's kinkiest scene, just when he's expecting her to straddle him and give him the sexual joyride of his young life, she wraps a cloth around his neck and strangles him instead. (Goldstein was obviously following Alfred Hitchcock's suggestion that murders should be staged like love scenes, and love scenes like murders.) The reason she did this was so she could find out where her eggs had gone, and learning that the Larsons were the only family who had children from her donated eggs, she sought them out, ran Kaylene down herself (is that really a surprise?), then impersonated a nurse at the hospital where Kaylene was being treated (it's established that she studied pharmacology in preparation for being a pharmacist but did not have a nursing degree) and used her knowledge of drugs to put Kaylene on so many opiates she'd be helpless to resist as Vanessa put her grand plan into effect. Apparently Vanessa lost it when she found out that her own reproductive organs had gone haywire and therefore she could no longer have any kids of her own, so with the knowledge that the children who had been born from her donated eggs were the only ones she'd ever have, she set out to find them and, once she did, to seduce Drew Larson away from Kaylene and get the kids to accept her as their "real" mom — which in fact she is, at least biologically.

The script isn't all that surprising and Goldstein's direction (except for that marvelously kinky murder scene) is straightforward and effective but uncreative, but where this movie scores more than most other Lifetime films along the same line is in the marvelous performances by Vanessa Marcil and Brooke Nevin as the female leads. Not only is Nevin appropriately bland and perky in the usual manner of Lifetime villainesses (their woman villains tend to be more interesting and psychologically complex than their male ones!), complete with her smarmy bedside manner — every time Kaylene tries to fight back against Vanessa's control, Vanessa assumes the guise of caring nurse and smarmily says thinks like, "I wouldn't do that," or "I'd advise against that" — she also plays the role in a tightly controlled manner that's quite different from the florid insanity Lifetime tends to give us in their male psychos. "The Wrong Mother" (not to be confused with "The Other Mother" or "Killer Mom," upcoming movies Lifetime was showing promos for during this one) is a pretty standard Lifetime-formula story, but both the quality of the writing of the two female leads and the vivid performances of Marcil and Nevin bringing them to life makes this one at least somewhat special — the two have real chemistry together and are both totally believable as antagonists.

This is a bad movie. Poor acting, bad storyline. It looks so cheap.

Don't hesitate to watch this thriller if you're looking to while away an afternoon or early evening as this flick has a cracking premise, superb plotline, good dialogue and fine acting...there's even an OMG moment in the denouement where you'll go, 'I can't believe that just happened!'

Though you'll work out early on what's going on, it's hard to second guess the villain as they have an unpredictable character...the twists will keep you hooked.

I find it baffling that females in TV movies look like feminine and attractive, while "females" in mainstream movies look like men. It's crazy. You look at these TV-Movie actresses, then look at mainstream actresses, and you gotta ask what the hell is going on?

Anyways...

About: A mentally ill lady tries to steal someones family.

Story: Interesting.

Production: Alright. Fair. The acting could be polished up. The children in these movies sounded so whiny, screechy voices. It's unrealistic.

Highlight: A worthless mutt named Pickles

main intelligence: 10 for the mentally ill lady. 1. For the family -10 for the hospital. Soon hospitals will be like Airports. (SECURITY SECURITY SECURITY.)

Unworthiness Level: 7. The men in this were worthless. A grown man was overpowered by a tiny lady, while a lady with a broken arm was able to over power the tiny lady who had a gun.

Were there any worthless mutts in this movie?: Yes. They called it Pickles.

Should you watch this? Not really. It's not bad, but the unworthiness stuff would probably make you quiver.

Parents, Kaylene (Marcil) and Drew (Snedden) were having problems conceiving so they went down the in-vitro fertilization path and were lucky enough to have twins, Zoey (Richardson) and Toby (Dodson). Years later, Kaylene is out biking when she's hit by a car. While in Hospital she meets Vanessa who has been assigned as her nurse. When it comes time to return home, Vanessa informs Kaylene and Drew that it may be hard for them to find a career. But if they want then she can come and care for Kaylene at home as her contract at the hospital is nearly over. Since the two women get along well Vanessa is employed to look after her. However, it soon becomes evident that Vanessa may have a different agenda.

This is a pretty standard thriller that is let down by a few niggling things, which should have been ironed out before filming.

Firstly, there's Kaylene's sister, Samantha (Bond). There are times when this character feels as though she's only there to drive the plot. For example, right from the start, she's very confrontational with Vanessa. This, in itself, isn't a bad idea, and needed to be handled better for it to work. Though Samantha actually challenges the nurse on what her sister is being medicated with, with no expertise on the subject. Samantha reckons washing Kaylene's hair is the best thing you can do to aid her recovery... which really isn't the case if the patient is dealing with a concussion. Then she just happens to have a friend who agrees with her, that she is being overmedicated and that he wouldn't prescribe these drugs. The trouble is, we're not even told if he's a doctor or just a knowledgeable nurse: For all we know, he may have gotten his doctorate as IWannaBADoctor.com (This is TV Movieland anyway!). Besides, what one Doctor prescribes another wouldn't as there are so many drugs to choose from now. Another thing, did Samantha give this person Kaylene's medical history so he could make a professional diagnosis? DAMN! - I really thought about this too much.

Secondly, there's the jump of believability that Kaylene has. She goes from accepting Vanessa is doing right by her and her care to suddenly distrusting her totally. But the trouble with this is that they don't fire Vanessa. Surely, if there was a shadow of a doubt that something wasn't quite right about her you'd fire her arse.

Then there are the kids. I'm sorry, but if you're a close and loving family then the kids will want to see their mother at the earliest opportunity. However, Toby and Zoey, are only all too happy to not bother her. If it had been me, I would have been sneaking in to see her. You don't even see them at the hospital with her. If the writer and director had added a couple of extra scenes with the kids it would have made the story a little more believable and relatable.

What this story really needed was time. Somebody should have taken the time to take a breath and address the errors or inconsistencies of this story being filmed. Both the story and the directing of this movie needed to be tightened up. The acting, on the other hand, is above average, except for Elizabeth Bond who is a little wooden at times, and not totally credible.

I'd recommend this to the thriller fans, though people who like mystery and whodunnit's need not watch as there's no mystery in who the bad guy... or gal... is. This is one of those afternoon movies to watch while you're off work sick.