Les disparus du lac

Rachel and Chuck Yoman (Valerie Harper, Gerald McRaney), decided the city is too busy and dangerous for their family, so they packed up their reluctant son (Gregory Togel) and daughter (Tammy Lauren) and moved back to a lake like the one Rachel lived at as a child.

They say you can not go home again but this is an ideal rural home with what at first seems like a Mayberry feel. Later the residence seems to be more like the people in Deliverance. Soon bodies start turning up and everybody looks suspect with the exception of a few friendly faces. This does not keep the family from enjoying running around and messing around in the woods.

We find that they have to be super ignorant to find the secrets and not tell anyone until they get ax-cepted as the antagonists.

Can the ignored young Stevie save his parents or will their pursuer(s) put his/her foot in it?

This film is more than most parodies as it was played with strait faces. They could not have chosen better actors and Daryl Anderson was exceptionally creepy. An added plus is that they let us know what is happening before the characters find out, instead of pulling a clue out of the hat after the fact. Anyway this made for TV movie is good for a few laughs.

A family moves into a new lakeside home and discovers a terrible secret about the community -- that there are a series of unsolved murders in the area. It's a movie you can watch on television or streaming. A family moves into a new lakeside home and discovers a terrible secret about the community -- that there are a series of unsolved murders in the area and they aren't sure what is going on. Anyway, not much more to add but the acting is very good and the script isn't as bad as a lot of the reviews here say. It's a mistake to watch this as a comedy unless you're really young or just like sci Fi movies.

This movie for the most part is just like your normal TV movie. Not incredible acting and for being in the horror genre it would have flopped at the box office, but hey, that's why it's on TV. When I first started watching this movie I never had the intention of finishing it. I left the room a couple times to go do something else but found myself always coming back, wondering, who was it? What was going on? The only complaint I have is that there weren't enough characters to suspect. The creepy factor was great though. I was creeped out the whole time and I was a little fascinated too. I wouldn't fight to see it again but I don't regret sitting there for the amount of time it took to watch it.

The premise of the story is common enough; average family wants out of the rat race; wants to find the simple life....so they move from Sherman Oaks,California to Lake Tomahawk; kids in tow.

The lake is beautiful, they have leased an old house....but wait; there may be something in the lake; people are being murdered, and no one knows how (never mind why). Gerald McRaney is excellent, a familiar face for Lifetime viewers; Valerie Harper is also good; since this film was made in '88 maybe the writer should produce a sequel!.

You will also enjoy Barry Corbin as the town eccentric, and Darryl Anderson as a Bruce Dern-lookalike/crazed military man.

While the story plot is a bit over the top; if you are a movie buff you will be reminded of similar scenarios from ""Psycho""; ""Deliverance""; as well as other horror stories of that genre. Several camera shots and sequences will give you a sense of deja vu.

Sit back and enjoy; if you don't take it too seriously it is very entertaining; and better than, for example the more recent movie:

""I Know What You Did Last Summer""; it seems they made better movies in the good old 80's!.

Well, this is an unusual little number. Other reviews range from 'okay' to 'not particularly glowing' to 'blah', but the plot sounded intriguing enough to me, and it's got a good cast.

Yes, it contains many of the standard made-for-tv melodrama features: sitcom stars Harper and McRaney--flipped from their usual light-hearted TV personas and quite convincing as a couple tired of the stress of city life; their winsome little kid and wiseacre teenager; and apparently enough money to go from their nice place in the city to a little slice of lakeside heaven.

As it progressed, I found that it went from average tv-movie quality to a pretty nifty (if unlikely) ending; the suspense in the last few scenes is especially good. The two leads are well matched and you root for them. Some viewers may guess who the heavy is but it's atmospheric--the lakeside locales are lovely -it moves along briskly, and is well acted. Worth a watch.