Rupture fatale

This film is everything that folks who make fun of Lifetime movies are making fun of. It suffers from a very poor script, and actors from the Mediocre School of Acting. The mother, in particular, is pretty dreadful, though the daughter could probably do quite well in another story with a different director.

Part of the problem is that at its heart, this is little more than an after school special, about a stupid teenage girl who does stupid things. We get it - we have been 'getting it' for the past ten years. And as such, this feels tired and washed out.

Some of the offerings from Lifetime are really very good, but this is not one of them. As average as they come. It should be called 'Breakup Nightmare: Now in Beige!'

In smallish-town Redford, beautiful 19-year-old Celesta DeAstis (as Rachel Light) likes to open her shirt and swap spit with handsome and muscular Mark Grossman (as Troy). He says college girls are coming on hard and wants to take some photos of Ms. DeAstis to remind him what he's got back home in Redford. After a make-out session, she reluctantly agrees to pose for some topless cellphone photos. Two weeks later, the couple has a bitter break-up, with DeAstis' sexy but strong-armed mama Jennifer Dorogi (as Barbara) throwing Mr. Grossman out on his keister. As you may have guessed, the topless photos are shared on the Internet. DeAstis can't go anywhere without eliciting sneers, snickers and sexual propositions...

"Break-Up Nightmare" is a fairly obvious story...

The "revenge pornography" topic is commendable. But this treatment, by director Mark Quod of writer Delondra Williams' tale, is woeful. It simply degenerates into absurdity. Best is the film's establishment of setting. They begin by giving us a look at Redford, with a little nod to the classic "Peyton Place" opening from the 1960s. Locations are nicely interspersed with interiors throughout. Best performance is that of DeAstis' curly-haired co-worker Freeman Lyon (as Ryan), he cracks bad jokes and acts most naturally. The producers make the town rich in institutionalized Black Power and reverse the gender roles given strong, eyebrow-arched Ms. Dorogi and her girly ex-husband. It seems too much like pandering, though.

**** Break-Up Nightmare (2016/3/6) Mark Quod ~ Jennifer Dorogi, Celesta DeAstis, Freeman Lyon, Mark Grossman

I saw this was produced by "The Asylum" which is the same team behind Syfy "hits" like Z Nation and Sharknado, etc. This was the only reason I continued to watch, as I normally have no interest in Lifetime shows or movies at all.

I honestly had the feeling that the movie was written/directed/produced in the same manner as a parody film like "Airplane", or "Scary Movie", and that they just dialed it back a tiny bit so it was not too overtly apparent. The end result is apparently the standard kind of Lifetime movie that all the girls and womens and other bon-bon chompers love to watch, all curled up under a cozy blanket or whatever.

Its so, so, so trite - so contrived - so utterly ludicrous. Its definitely laughable, on its face - but again the whole premise is just boring enough so that it actually rides the line between complete farce and standard TV movie. If this was intentionally done - its fairly brilliant. I can see this as a winning formula for subversive production teams who are forced to somehow pay the bills, and yet still wish to leverage their particular talents and skills. Its almost Troma-like in its blatant and wanton stupidity.

So, Im not sure what kind of rating to give it - because I could be reading far too much into this. It could be a very honest and earnest attempt at a "solid Lifetime movie", whatever that is. I just have a hard time thinking the guys behind Sharknado would be able to do something like this without recognizing the inherent tongue-in-cheek nature of the material.

Its worth a watch in this light, if you don't have anything better to do. Somewhat fascinating in a "what if..." kind of way.

I know that lifetime movies are not known for their amazing plot and story lines.. but this movie is horrible. The plot is ridiculous, the writing is comical.. no one reacts like that..and the acting is so fake..the best actors in the movie were the cops who arrested the kid in the house.. because they didn't talk much. Please take some acting classes!

This movie starts off like a warning about sexting after a girl's pictures end up on a revenge porn website. Mom and daughter try hard to take them down but the police are not too co-operative. They suspect her ex boyfriend. There are some twists and turns to keep you entertained enough. Things end up more like a typical Lifetme thriller eventually.

Watchable enough.