Big Lies in a Small Town

Rhonda Dent stars as a mother who searches for her daughter, who goes missing after a car crash. Things get even more complicated as she discovers that many people died in mysterious circumstances following the car accident. She soon discovers a shocking possibility and needs to act quickly to get her daughter back.

This is a well-made thriller that benefits from some fine acting, especially by Rhonda Dent, who plays the mother role and is convincingly distressed and desperate to get her daughter back. It's sort of predictable halfway through in regards to who has abducted her daughter, though the why and wherefores isn't clear. There's a sense of foreboding and menace, thanks to the character and atmosphere.

Seriously, I hate to say it, but right away I could tell this was a movie stacked with Canadian actors.

Dont get me wrong there are some A list Canadians that I admire and know are brilliantly talented.

In the range of A to D list, these are all very clearly D list actors.

To be fair, the plot was incredibly weak and unrealistic, this may have given way to the emptiness , non emotional and disjointed plot lines.

It felt like the actors were reading a script and not living the character.

I hung in watching because its -40 below outside,forced to stay home... I was able to play solitair on my phone at the same time, win and watch.

That should say it all.

Looking to watch a movie for a bit of entertainment and stumbled across this one.

Same old made for TV movie.

Predictable characters and fair acting.

The mother in the movie didn't seem that upset that her daughter was missing. I would have been frantic.

The suspect seemed obvious about half way through the movie.

Can't say that we really enjoyed it.

It was a way to pass some time but I definitely wouldn't recommend it to anyone.

The so called mother and daughter in the movie seemed a little too close in age for it to be believable.

Could have been thought out a bit better than it was .

This is one of many many Lifetime type "thrillers" wherein a child or daughter goes missing in a small tight knit town - typically after some sort of accident. The mother or relative immediately go searching.

As with all these movies, the sheriff is either involved or not involved, and you typically don't find out til the end. Nonetheless, the pleadings of the mother are almost immediately dismissed. The mother then posts a missing persons flyer on the sheriff bulletin board where oh my gosh there are tons of other photos of missing children there too. Surprisingly, that was not the case here.

Notwithstanding, the mother still falls into the same trappings of all the movies of this genre. She starts blabbing all her leads to anyone who will listen, breaks into houses looking for clues, and confronts people at their place of business accusing them of horrid crimes.

The movie does an admirable job of keeping you guessing "what's actually going on" and, to be fair, the "big secret" is not reasonably guessable. That said, it's a little perplexing that the villainous people allow her to prance around town stirring up suspicions with impunity - while on the other hand they were quick to kill people's at the drop of a hat if they display the least bit of intelligence or suspicion.

By the way, wouldn't you think an 18-19 year old fit-looking girl could outrun a 50 year old grumpy stumpy beer-bellied man on level terrain? I guess not.

Anyways, it was refreshing to see the baddie husband get a knife shoved into his neck and otherwise beat down rather than get shot by the sheriff coming out of nowhere at the last minute as is typical in these movies.

This is an above average LMN movie, but has a storyline that is really very similar to another LMN movie "Into the Arms of Danger".

Similarities:

1. Young woman ready to go college goes missing just before staring school.

2. Mother (parents) frantically search for her and go through all sorts of hurdles.

3. Police are of no help whatsoever (at first), and then they catch on.

Unique Points:

1. The Santa Claus-looking character that is an established "heavy" (where are his elves?)

2. The true perpetrators - some solid-gold screwballs that I did not expect.

If you saw "Into the Arms of Danger" and enjoyed it, you'll probably enjoy this.

It looks like the LMN group has a template that they reference when they make a move - this one is the girl ready to go to college goes missing and her parents try to find her.

6/10.