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Toni Braxton and David Julian Hirsh in *Twist of Faith*.

Don’t be fooled by Lifetime’s promotion of Twist of Faith (2013) as an interfaith romance. This extraordinarily bizarre film, starring Toni Braxton as a Methodist gospel singer who unbreaks the heart of a grieving Orthodox cantor, is something rarer: a religious Rorschach test from the same network that brought us Trapped by My Sugar Daddy, Psycho Yoga Instructor and Baby Monitor: The Sound of Fear. Whether it leaves you feeling uplifted or appalled is a matter of (very) personal taste — and to a lesser extent, a reflection of your ability to perform rudimentary math.

Twist of Faith’s timeline is shockingly condensed: Nearly as soon as we meet teacher and cantor Jacob Fisher (David Julian Hirsh), his wife and three children are lost to a senseless act of violence. After sitting shiva in a nearly catatonic state, he leaves his personal belongings behind — including his kippah and tzitzit — and boards a southbound bus from Brooklyn, finding himself homeless in rural Alabama. When Nina Jones (Braxton), a fellow teacher, first spots him, it’s hardly love at first sight. “There’s a white guy sleeping over there by the church. Keep your eye on him,” she warns her uncle Moe (Mykelti Williamson).

The Day the Loving Stopped: Rhoda, McCloud and a Very ’70s Divorce

By Cranky Lesbian

On October 13, 2023

In TV Movies

Valerie Harper and Dennis Weaver in *The Day the Loving Stopped*.

As if Rhoda Morgenstern’s divorce from Joe Gerard wasn’t emotionally bruising enough, here Valerie Harper (Goodbye, Supermom) goes again, putting us through the wringer in The Day the Loving Stopped (1981). This telefilm about a 1970s split with ’80s repercussions isn’t as giddily melodramatic as its title suggests, but coed Judy Danner (Dominique Dunne, Valentine Magic on Love Island) sure cries a lot, a trait shared with mother Norma (Harper). Younger sister Debbie (Ally Sheedy) gets so fed up with all the waterworks that she eventually snaps “Just knock it off!” — it was either that or break into “No More Tears (Enough is Enough).”

The family has gathered for Judy’s wedding to Danny Reynolds (James Canning), a persistent classmate who is resolutely untroubled by his betrothed’s ambivalence about marriage and hostility toward her estranged father, Aaron (Dennis Weaver of Cocaine: One Man’s Seduction). Alone together, the sweethearts can’t put groceries in the trunk without pausing to kiss. Alone with her thoughts, or with Debbie, Judy’s a waterlogged mess who isn’t sure she believes in love. “I’ve never seen it last. I don’t know if it does. Don’t you understand?” she asks, increasingly hysterical. We do, but she clarifies: “I don’t want to do to my kids what they did to us.”

Kate Jackson Fools Around in The Silence of Adultery

By Cranky Lesbian

On September 23, 2023

In TV Movies

Kate Jackson and Robert Desiderio in *The Silence of Adultery*.

The loftiness — and supreme silliness — of The Silence of Adultery’s title drew me in because it was almost Bergmanesque. Doesn’t it conjure mental images of Erland Josephson or Max von Sydow meeting Harriet Andersson or Ingrid Thulin in a barn in rural Sweden for joyless assignations before an indifferent, possibly nonexistent God? And while we’re asking unserious questions, if your adultery is silent does that mean you’re doing it wrong?

This 1995 Lifetime movie isn’t prurient enough to provide an unequivocal answer, but there isn’t much heat between the married Rachel Lindsey (Kate Jackson) and Michael Harvott (Robert Desiderio), a recently separated father. They’re introduced when Michael brings his nonverbal son to the barn where Rachel offers equine therapy to autistic kids. Her qualifications are unclear — the script says she isn’t a doctor, despite IMDb calling her one — and don’t matter, anyway. Autism is merely a plot device to introduce the lovers.

Connie Sellecca Cries and Commits Bigamy in She Led Two Lives

By Cranky Lesbian

On September 14, 2023

In TV Movies

Connie Sellecca and Perry King in *She Led Two Lives*.

We meet Rebecca Cross (Connie Sellecca), a 35-year-old flannel enthusiast with a flawless complexion and unfortunate bangs, when she’s hauled off to jail in handcuffs. Suspenseful music plays as she’s booked — what crime did the mild-mannered cancer researcher commit? For the answer, let us turn to one of Barbra Streisand’s greatest hits: Rebecca is “A Woman in Love.” And she’ll do anything to get Mike (A Martinez) into her world and hold him within, even if it means committing bigamy. It’s a right she defends over and over again.

Rebecca is already married to Jeffrey (Perry King of Inmates: A Love Story), a dashing surgeon. Weeks earlier, he slid a bracelet onto her wrist for their seventh wedding anniversary and proposed a toast: “To Rebecca. I didn’t think it was possible but I love you more today than the day we were married.” And then he is paged to the operating room, a familiar conclusion to their nights together. Her loneliness is accentuated by her father’s deathbed regret at not spending more time with loved ones, a fate he implores her to avoid.

Twirl: A Baton-Twirling Competition Tests a Friendship

By Cranky Lesbian

On August 29, 2023

In TV Movies

Lisa Whelchel, Erin Moran, and Moran’s false lashes, in *Twirl*.

Pauline Kael’s review of Urban Cowboy memorably concludes with a question to its writers and director: “James Bridges, Aaron Latham, have you been riding a head-pounding machine?” From Twirl’s earliest moments and throughout its duration, you might wonder the same of its filmmakers — had they sustained baton-related head injuries? Did they ever recover?

Clearly they were influenced by Cowboy (released theatrically a year earlier, in 1980), a moderately campy and classist crowd-pleaser masquerading as something more serious. Baton-crazed besties Bonnie Lee Jordan (Erin Moran of Happy Days and Joanie Loves Chachi) and Jill Moore (Lisa Whelchel of The Facts of Life) never mount a mechanical bull, but they share a boundless passion for twirling, which consumes their identities.

In Twirl’s dizzying opening moments, the girls trade voice-overs expressing sentiments such as this: “You know what it means to twirl? It means not havin’ time for messin’ around with my friends, it means sayin’ no to dates on twirlin’ days. When I am out there twirlin’ my heart away, no explanation is necessary.” Viewers may beg to differ, of course, but Bonnie Lee continues: “It is worth it? The bruises, swollen fingers and even black eyes? Yes, it is all worth it. I am a Texas twirler.”

Parkinson’s, Part II

By Cranky Lesbian

On August 12, 2023

In Brainpan

8/27 update: Twirl review coming by Tuesday at the latest; got waylaid by continued shoulder problems. Thanks for your patience!

TV movie fans: I’ll be back soon with a look at “Twirl,” a very special exploration of the ultra-competitive world of baton-twirling starring Lisa Whelchel and Erin Moran.

“How has your mood been lately?” the neurologist asked last week at my first follow-up appointment since being diagnosed with early-onset Parkinson’s in June. I was there for the neck and shoulder Botox injections that were previously delayed by levodopa adjustments, but she set aside extra time to discuss the diagnosis itself since our last meeting had been rushed.

“I’m told there’s room for improvement,” I replied modestly.

“Are you depressed?”

“I’m not sure if I’m depressed-depressed. But it’s depressing to be told at 40 that you have Parkinson’s.”

Vows of Deception: Cheryl Ladd’s Trashy Femme Fatale

By Cranky Lesbian

On July 27, 2023

In TV Movies

Cheryl Ladd and Nick Mancuso in *Vows of Deception*.

Disappointingly, given its title and “inspired by actual events” origins, Vows of Deception isn’t a Lifetime dramatization of Renée Zellweger and Kenny Chesney’s marriage. But Vows, which aired on CBS in 1996, makes up for that shortcoming by giving Cheryl Ladd an enjoyably trashy role to sink her teeth into as Lucinda ‘Lucy Ann’ Michaels, a prodigiously pregnant recent parolee who moves cross-country to live with Terry (Nancy Cartwright), her more responsible sister.

“My past doesn’t determine my future,” she unconvincingly tells Matt Harding (Nick Mancuso), the detective who meets her at a bus stop with papers to sign. Apparently lacking any crimes to investigate, he offers her a ride and later enlists her help in pranking his best friend Clay (Mike Farrell), a prosperous lawyer, in a blind date setup. Instantly smitten, Clay surprises them both by continuing the date despite her baby bump. Earnest to a fault, he couldn’t be an easier mark for a dazzling criminal with a questionable tale of woe (she claims an abusive ex falsely accused her of child abuse).

Second Serve: Vanessa Redgrave Plays Doubles in Richards Biopic

By Cranky Lesbian

On July 20, 2023

In TV Movies

There is initially something jarring about Vanessa Redgrave’s performance as Renée Richards, the pioneering transgender athlete, in Second Serve. Her unconvincing male appearance pre-transition conjures memories of Jean Arless as gawky Warren in William Castle’s Homicidal, a classic Psycho knockoff with a memorable gender gimmick, and you worry this 1986 CBS adaptation of Richards’s autobiography might cheapen a complex story. But it doesn’t take long for the magnetic Redgrave to draw you in, particularly when filmed in medium-closeups that remove her hips (which, like Shakira’s, don’t lie) from the equation.

We’re introduced to Renée first as Dr. Richard Raskind (changed to Radley for the film), and Redgrave exudes an Anthony Perkins quality—lanky, haunted, alternately reserved and impetuous—that suits the character well. You suspect she understands Richard, whose private struggles with gender dysphoria aren’t immediately revealed, more intuitively than director Anthony Page (I Never Promised You a Rose Garden) and screenwriters Gavin Lambert and Stephanie Liss. Yet there are limits to her powers of empathy. You’d never guess from Redgrave’s vaguely WASPy characterization (and sometimes thinly-suppressed British accent) that she’s playing a Queens-bred Jew.*

Wimbledon 2023 Concludes

By Cranky Lesbian

On July 16, 2023

In Tennis

“You could’ve cut the sexual tension between Billie Jean King and Kate Middleton with a knife…”

“Are you crying?” It’s the three-word question my wife asks at the conclusion of nearly every Grand Slam tennis tournament, and this afternoon she posed it after coming downstairs to find me crumpled on the living room floor just seconds after the men’s final ended. The answer, of course, was yes.

“Juan-Carlos Ferrero is crying, I think his dad is crying… His mom and I have been crying since match point,” I replied. (During his post-match interview, even Novak Djokovic was in tears of an unhappier sort.) My favorite women’s player, Iga Świątek, was bounced from Wimbledon in the quarterfinals by Elina Svitolina, a better showing than last year’s and cause for great optimism about her chances in 2024. And now my favorite men’s player, Carlos Alcaraz, #1 in the world and barely 20 years old, was climbing into the stands to embrace his family ahead of the trophy presentation.

Behold the Magic and Wonder of Tears and Laughter: The Joan and Melissa Rivers Story

By Cranky Lesbian

On July 11, 2023

In TV Movies

Joan and Melissa Rivers in *Tears and Laughter*.

You can keep your Mildred Pierce and Mermaids, your Steel Magnolias and Terms of Endearment—Tears and Laughter: The Joan and Melissa Rivers Story (1994) is the greatest mother-daughter movie of all-time. “But what about Mommie Dearest?” you might counter. “What about Volver, Imitation of Life, Freaky Friday or Postcards from the Edge?”

To which I can only reply that Tears and Laughter is a dramedy about producer Edgar Rosenberg’s suicide starring his actual widow, Joan Rivers, and their daughter Melissa, a non-actress whose performance is the made-for-TV equivalent of Sofia Coppola’s maligned turn in The Godfather Part III. If you love things that are terrible, it gets no better than this, a tearjerker that opens with liposuction jokes and excerpts from a typical Rivers routine: “I went to Las Vegas, I threw my hotel key up at Tom Jones. He took it and burglarized my room.”