My Daughter’s Been Kidnapped (2020 Lifetime)
Cast: Boti Bliss, Morgan Obenreder, Rebecca Marshall, Austin Falk, Sophia Katarina
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Synopsis (via Lifetime)
A single mother races against time to save her epileptic teenage daughter from sex traffickers.
Thoughts
A woman is running, and no one is surprised. She runs through a flashing room (seizures warning. Sooooo flashy.) screaming for Kelsey. It is a dream. The woman wakes up, terrified. The woman’s name is Gina, and she has a daughter named Kelsey, who has epilepsy. Gina leaves her bed and gives Kelsey extra medication in the middle of the night.
It is the first day of school, and Kelsey is excited to be back. Her and her friend, Toni, carry around bottles of epilepsy pills and ogle a popular girl. The popular girl’s name is Melissa, and she invites Kelsey to milkshake lunch. Kelsey shows them that she has a photographic memory, and the popular kids are impressed. “Smart is hot!”
Outside of their house, a man takes pictures with a telephoto lens. Gina and Kelsey are none the wiser.
Melissa invites Kelsey (and reluctantly Toni) to a pool party. The girls drink margaritas and swoon over the cute boy at the party named Jason. (He is not your typical Lifetime stud, maybe when he grows up!) Then they start pounding shots. Jason and Kelsey makeout as Melissa watches on in a kaftan. Toni is uncomfortable, and she gets even more uncomfortable when a body is found floating lifelessly in the pool. The cops arrive and question the parents who claim they weren’t there, but the dad was totally the DJ? Speaking on parents, Gwen hysterically picks up Kelsey from the party. She just wants to know that her daughter is safe, but it is overkill.
A memorial party is thrown for Jessica, the girl who drowned. (It is Melissa standing making a toast to five teens sadly drinking wine, haha!) Kelsey is invited, and Toni is not. When Kelsey arrives dressed in black, she meets Mel’s parents Michelle and Ryan. They tell Kelsey that she needs to keep quiet about them being at the party because it wouldn’t look good. Kelsey leaves the party, and Mel takes it personally.
Jason asks Kelsey out on a pizza/arcade date. They are followed by the man in his car with the telephoto lens. Kelsey goes to the bathroom to take her medication and goes missing. Jason calls the police, and Gina comes running frantically… again. Detectives tell her calm down, but Gina doubles down and searches for Kelsey everywhere. Gina interrogates Melissa. Melissa calls Gina crazy and taunts her. The police issue an amber alert and advise Gina to talk to Kelsey’s father.
Kelsey wakes up blindfolded and chained to a bed. She was kidnapped in the bathroom. Without her medication, she only has 48 hours until she starts having violent seizures. Kelsey begs her capture to let her free or at least give her her pills. She is a fighter and bangs/screams to be heard. Kelsey knows who her captor is by the perfume; it is Mel’s mother.
Gina is at a level 10 and screams/cries at her ex-husband, who is sober now. She pulls a gun on him and makes show her his basement. The ex-husband is handcuffed and questioned; he was the man in the car with the telephoto lens who was stalking them. He just wanted to be close to his family again. (Awwww?)
Melissa’s parents accidentally killed Jessica and made it look like an accident. They question their daughter about Kelsey’s epilepsy. Ryan goes to Gina’s house and tries to steal the medication. Gwen and Toni fight him off. They even severely scratch his face. As he is running off, Gwen realizes what he is there for and calls for him to come back. (Haha! This movie is something else.) Detectives are on to them; oh wait… detective Mike is in on it?!?!?!? They are all involved in a sex trafficking ring.
Gina learns from Melissa that all her prettiest friends go missing. She tells Detective Mike and then watches videos of the parent’s pleading for their daughter’s safe return. Meanwhile, Kelsey is still attempting to free herself and have conversations with Melissa’s mom. (Who tells Kelsey she is going to be human trafficked.)
Melissa skips school, which triggers Gina to realize something is off. She goes over to Melissa’s house and asks the parents if everything is all right. Things are not alright. Gina goes to another detective and places suspicions on Detective Mike.
Gina and her ex-husband are held at gunpoint by Melissa’s dad Ryan. He throws things around the house while Gina looks scared, hiding behind her ex-husband. The ex-husband rushes Ryan and gets shot, then Gina gets the gun and shoots Ryan. Detective Mike is disappointed to hear that Ryan didn’t kill them.
Melissa goes down to the basement and talks to Kelsey. Then she leaves the key. Kelsey frees herself. She then fakes an epileptic seizure to get Melissa’s mother downstairs and stabs her. Detective Mike arrives on the scene, and Melissa locks him out of the house and sends Kelsey to hide upstairs. Detective Mike looks for Kelsey. (Who is hiding in a closet, a la Jamie Lee Curtius in Halloween.) He finds her, and she screams.
Gina runs frantically into the room with a gun. This time her level ten is appropriate. Detective Mike grabs her weapon, but the bullets are emptied out. While he is confused, Gina stabs him in the heart with an Epi-Pen. “You shouldn’t have messed with my family,” she says, and Detective Mike falls to the ground.
The teens are all friends now. (Including Melissa?) It is like a Noxima commercial. Gina continues to hover and be too extra. Thee end!
Side Note
Minority Report: Toni, Math Teacher, Detective from another department.
Also Known as Killer in Suburbia
Except for Morgan Obenreder, & Austin Falk, the acting here was terrible.
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Overall rating
🔪🔪 (2 Knives)
🍷🍷🍷 (3 glasses of wine required.)
*Photo Credit: © 2020 Lifetime
