A MOTHER'S TESTIMONY

US, 2000, 90 minutes, Colour.
Kate Jackson, Susan Blakely, Chad Allen, Daniel Roebuck, Olivia Burnette.
Directed by Julian Chognacki.

A Mother's Testimony is an interesting telemovie about mother-son relationships. Kate Jackson portrays the mother of a young man who comes out of prison charged with armed burglary. He declares his innocence, just being drunk and a bystander. He is welcomed back. His mother's friend enables him to get a job fixing boats. However, a prison companion, Warren, comes back and his mother thinks he is bad company. When their car runs out of petrol one night and the two men flag down a driver and get the petrol, he is discovered as missing. Gradually the son tells the truth to his mother, that once again he was observing while his friend went berserk. About an hour into the film, we suddenly see the son acting in a particularly violent manner against a former fellow prisoner and the undesirable friend standing back and urging him off. It emerges that the friend only wanted the truck. The son is a psychopath. It is very hard on his mother, especially when she is urged by a school friend who is now the DA, played by Susan Blakely, to give testimony. She finally goes to prison, looks at and listens to her son and gives testimony against him.

Interesting themes of family relationships, responsibility for evil, psychopaths, justice and the law.

1. A telemovie about family themes, extending more widely into social themes of psychopathic behaviour, brutality, justice and prison sentences?

2. The small-town setting, the home, the surrounding woods, the restaurant, the courts? The musical score? The credibility of the plot: the story of Kenny, his growing up, behaviour, crimes? Sharon and her responsibility for her son's upbringing? Her neglect of her daughter, the youngest child? Sharon feeling responsible for Kenny - and ultimately saying she had brought a monster into the world?

3. The character of Sharon: bringing up the three children, her friendship with Ian, the preparations for Kenny's homecoming, the celebrations, her loving him more than the other children, trying to help? Urging him to a new beginning? Her work at the restaurant, leaving to help her son? The breakdown, her asking Kenny about what happened when he didn't turn up? Her believing his telling the truth, his excusing himself? The confrontation about the blood on the shirt and his answer? Her inability to think ill of her son, always promising to defend him, wanting him to tell the truth? Her response to his story about Warren? Ian and his trying to make her see the reality? The encounter with Donna, the discussions, finally admitting the truth to her but yet unable to give testimony against her son? Her visiting the widow of the murdered man, awkward, but feeling that she must? The gradual pressure, listening to Kenny's stories, his arrest? Donna urging him to ask him for the truth, her visit to the prison, listening to his story? The melodrama of her nightmare of going to prison and shooting him? Her going to the court, her testimony, the evidence of the shirt and her knowing that he had told her lies? Her disowning her son? Her continued anguish about her responsibility and what more she should have done - especially with her daughter attacking her for not giving her any consideration?

4. The character of Kenny, audiences believing him till about an hour into the film, pleasant looking, manners, Warren, his love for his mother, his work at his job? His plausible explanations, his wanting his mother to help him? His being with Warren in the club, the ex-prisoner attacking about the guitar (which we had seen being smashed during the credits)? Warren bashing the young man, Kenny taking over and cutting his hand and his tendons? His being presented in the flashbacks of the crime cowering in the car, the reality and his being the perpetrator? Going to prison, the way that he told his mother the story? His being in court, disowned? A psychopath?

5. The younger brother, his concern about his older brother, glad that he was home? His being neglected by his mother? The sister, her boyfriend, Kenny's reaction, the talk at breakfast in the kitchen? Her not having any friends after the accusations?

6. Warren, turning up, audience thinking the worst of him, thinking with Sharon? The night, the gun and the money? Audience assuming that Warren had killed the man? The flashbacks, Kenny's version, the truth? The bashing of the man outside the club and audiences knowing that Warren was not so bad?

7. Donna, the successful DA, the restaurant and discussions with Sharon, Sharon's denials, gradually telling the truth, encouraged by Donna, the interview with Kenny? Arranging for Sharon to meet the widow? The final discussions with Sharon, her evidence in court?

8. The police and investigations, the widow and the visit by Sharon, Sharon listening to the phone call from the family friend? The atmosphere of the small town, friends, the restaurants, clubs? The repercussions of such a brutal murder in the town and the result for Kenny, the result for Sharon? The final family mean and support?