One of two competing TV miniseries released months apart in 1987 based on the Frances Schreuder case, (the delusional wannabe socialite who pressured her sons into murdering her father for his money); the other being Nutcracker: Money, Madness and Murder starring Lee Remick. In this one, Stefanie Powers plays Schreuder in a perpetual state of wide-eyed indignation that is amazing to behold. I haven’t seen Powers in a lot of things, but I believe she’s a more than adequate actress. She must have been directed to maintain the crazed stare and pitch of hysteria that she displays here. If the movie was more compelling, Powers’ performance could have entered the camp pantheon alongside Faye Dunaway’s from Mommie Dearest. The film’s style is somewhere between one and two decades out of fashion, featuring all kinds of outdated cliches, from the star smearing lipstick on a mirror to convey female dementia, to the recurring voice-overs to showcase inner dialogues. It’s not bad; it’s entertaining in a cheesy way. John Wood is a standout among the cast, as Schreuder’s friend Richard Behrens, a part played by John Glover in Nutcracker. All in all, it’s exactly the kind of overwrought docudrama that John Waters brilliantly parodied in Serial Mom (1994), especially in the courtroom scenes where the imperious defendant scribbles frantic notes for her lawyer as everyone testifies against her.
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