How ironic that one of my recent posts was about how cinematic and thematic television can be. I’m about to show that the very opposite can be true as well. It’s time for another installment of So Bad It’s Good, where I take a closer, more analytical look at my guilty pleasure – bad movies. The kinds of things you can only watch with other people who won’t judge you, and with whom you can exchange incredulous glances.
I’m not quite as well-versed in the Lifetime Original Movie as I am in the beloved Syfy Original Movie (because the Lifetime movie is a much more complex art form), but I’ve watched enough to understand that, like the legendary Syfy movie, Lifetime programming has a few revisited tropes that make it truly one of a kind. Here they are, in no particular order.
Lifetime Rule #1: A True Story (or something that might have happened to someone once, and it was sad)
Did a woman just go on trial for something? Did two famous people just tie the knot? Time for Lifetime to swoop in and tell the REAL story. From huge news events like the royal wedding to little known high school controversies, Lifetime movies run the gamut of ripped from the headlines plots. William and Kate speculates about events in the private relationship between the royals. Amanda Knox: Murder on Trial in Italy told Knox’s story before her the case was even closed. And who could forget Fab Five: The Texas Cheerleader Scandal, which told the well-known story of a group of ruthless high school cheerleaders out to ruin their coach’s life? I know I followed that story for months, didn’t you?
Lifetime Rule #2: A Hot-Button Issue
Whether their movies are about teenage pregnancies or cyberbullying, Lifetime is very topical. Take the gem The Boy She Met Online, which examines the dangers of interacting with strangers over the Internet. That boy your teenage daughter is flirting with in a chat room could be a convict with a boy band haircut. Be on the lookout for prison tattoos. The Client List, starring Jennifer Love Hewitt, took a look at suburban prostitution. And then Lifetime decided it was so good, they should turn it into a TV series. And doesn’t this preview for the show make it look like such a respectable examination of a serious issue?
Lifetime Rule #3: Stupid Teenagers
Ah, Lifetime teens and their shenanigans. From STDs to peer pressure, they sure know how to make terrible decisions. An outbreak of syphilis terrorizes a high school in She’s Too Young, as fifteen-year-old girls lament their disappointing romantic experiences as if they were middle-aged. I unfortunately realize these depictions are based in reality, but that doesn’t mean these kids aren’t ridiculous. The girls in Fab Five enjoy lollipops while they frame their coach for sexual harassment. Basically, you just want to slap them all. And a lot of Lifetime movies feature a nerdy or prudish girl who suddenly gets caught up in something promiscuous. Like in Walking the Halls, which examines high school prostitution.
Lifetime Rule #4: A Title that Explains the Entire Plot (preferably with a colon thrown in)
What do you think The Boy She Met Online is about? Or Too Young to Be A Dad? Exactly what their titles say! That’s the beauty of the Lifetime movie. When you flip through the guide trying to figure out what to watch, you don’t even have to read the plot descriptions to figure out that you’re in for a treat. And don’t forget the colons. Every good Lifetime movie based on a true story has a colon. Heck, Lifetime movie titles have more colons put together than the titles of my papers for school. And I like a colon. Not as much as a semicolon, but still …
Lifetime Rule #5: An Underdeveloped, Almost Invisible Subplot
The most famous of these subplots, at least among my friends and me, occurs in The Boy She Met Online. Blink and you’ll miss it. The mother of the titular “She” has a female friend who’s always at the house. The girl comes home and said Friend is sitting on the kitchen counter with her leg up Mrs. Robinson-style as Mom makes dinner. Friend walks around the house holding laundry baskets. She sits up at night on Mom’s couch waiting for Mom to come home, and then questions her about where she was. For my friends and me, the movie became less about the boy she met online and more about whether Mom and Friend were in a romantic relationship. Totally cool if they were, but Lifetime would not address it. Unintentional? Maybe, but all the pieces seem to fit together too perfectly. I guess we’ll never know… until the sequel.
Lifetime Rule #6: At Least One “Did That Just Happen?” Moment
There’s always a great twist in a Lifetime movie. Some of them are more complicated than others. And some of them are downright crazy. At the end of Sexting in Suburbia, a girl’s private photo is forwarded around the school, but no one can figure out who sent it. At the end of the movie, we find out who it was. I don’t want to ruin the surprise, because I know you’re about to go watch it, but let’s just say it’s one of the last people you’d expect … and it’s kind of creepy.
Lifetime Rule #7: No Dads
Lifetime movies rarely have dads. There’s always a single mom struggling to raise her teenage daughter and possibly a bratty younger son. There’s often no mention of where the dad is. You know how none of the Disney princesses have mothers? None of the girls in Lifetime movies have dads. One exception is Walking the Halls, in which there’s a dad in the picture, but he’s pretty terrible.
Lifetime Rule #8: Not all Lifetime-worthy movies premiere on Lifetime.
I consider Cyberbully, which premiered on ABC Family, to be an honorary Lifetime movie. It tells the story of a teenage girl whose life spirals out of control when she joins a social networking site called Cliquester (Yep…) and her classmates begin to bully her. She posts a video announcing her suicide, and when her best friend (and emergency personnel) arrive at her house, she’s having a little trouble. She can’t get the cap off the pill bottle. Yeah…
Let’s just say it’s a good thing I don’t get Lifetime Movie Network.
Pop and Ceremony 