BEAUTIFUL & TWISTED

US, 2015, 90 minutes, Colour.
Rob Lowe, Paz Vega, Candice Bergen, Seychelle Gabriel, Jude Ciccolella, Michelle Hurd.
Directed by Chris Zalla.

This film is allegedly based on a true story, the murder of millionaire Ben Novack by his Hispanic wife.

The film opens with a narrative from the murdered Ben Novack, going back over his life and experience with his wife, commenting favourably on her but then less and less favourably as she becomes more violent. There is an initial scene where she goes to the bank, transfers money from husband’s private box but is stopped because she is not a signatory to the documents. Then, flashbacks.

Paz Vega portrays a mother of a young girl, a stripper and lap dancer in a club – a touch prurient in the portrayal of performances in the club. She attracts the attention of Ben Novack who explains that he was brought up in the context of the Fontainebleau Hotel in Florida, his parents more skilled at socialising than parenting, his learning facts of life, sex and drugs in the back rooms of the hotel, and now frequenting strip clubs. He makes approaches to Narci but is rejected until he saves her from an attempted rape.

When he takes her to see his mother, Candice Bergen in a flamboyant performance, she is dismissive but is attracted to May, Narci’s daughter. May grows up up to be a well-educated and sensible young woman, able to manage her father’s business affairs. He, meanwhile, does take up with more strippers much to the anger of his wife. She becomes more vengeful, eventually hiring killers to murder her husband’s mother, then hiring them to murder him – and a final attempt on the daughter.

Rob Lowe, executive producer for the film, has performed in a number of television film similar to this one and seems to wander through the film as Ben Novack with comparative ease, always coming back to his wife, infatuated with her and loving her. Paz Vega seems to relish the opportunity to play this kind of bad girl, pulling all the stops out in her luxurious lifestyle after the death of her husband. Seychelle Gabriel as May is a beacon of common sense.

The film shows the Miami police interested in the case but accepting accidental death in the case of the mother, accepting the wife’s testimony at first glance, but then pursuing the details of the investigation.

In fact, this is the story of people who appear in gossip columns, flashy and wealthy, sleazy and violent – and not really worth the attention of a television film, no matter how titillating the story.