Angels Fall (2007)

**SPOILERS** Having her car break down in the wide open spaces of the state of Wyoming Reese Gilmore, Heather Lockear,is out of money and a place to say until her car in repaired. Stuck in the town of Angles Fall Reese ends up getting a job at Jonnie's place-the Angle Food Diner-run by, you guessed, Jonnie, Linda Darlow.As it tuns out Reese turns the greasy spoon eating establishment into the top gourmet spot in the state having people from as far away as Cheyenne and Jackson Hole travel there to savor the hot and testy dishes that she cooks up. We soon learn that some five years ago Reese was a top chef back in Boston at the top rated Maneo Restaurant. We also sadly learn that Reese was the only survivor of a massacre at the restaurant where 14 of her friends and fellow employees were gunned down by a crazed madman who has never been caught!Trying to put her shattered life back together Reese after months of mental therapy and shock treatment now wants to start a new life at friendly Angles Fall but things don't seem to work out the way she hoped that they would. Hiking in the woods one morning Reese spots, with her binoculars, a couple arguing by the river bank. The argument leads to murder with the man strangling and then bashing the women's head in and then taking off in the woods! After a very traumatized Reese reported the incident to Angles Fall's Sheriff Rick Marsdsen, Gary Hudson, a search was made of the area with nothing, no body no blood no clothing, being found! Wanting to drop the case and get back to the business's at hand, like giving out parking tickets, Sheriff Marsden is bothered by the very insistent Rease in finding the body of the woman that she claimed to have seen murdered and the man who murdered her!As it soon becomes apparent to Sheriff Marsden, and almost everyone else in town, that the trauma Reese has been suffering from, since the Boston restaurant massacre, has effected her mind and caused her to conjure up the incident at the river bank! An incident that nobody but Reese's boyfriend Angels Fall's world famous mystery writer Brody, John Schaech, believes! That's until the murdered woman, through a police composite sketch, was positively identified as being that of Jackson Hole stripper Donna James, Shannon Tuer, who's been missing for over a week!It's then with his victim identified, and the evidence to her murder leading straight to him, that the unknown killer comes out into the open. This in order to shut up Reese by murdering her and making it look like she, being as mentally unstable as she is, killed herself! The only problem the killer has is that Reese's boyfriend Brody who unlike herself is not suffering from severe mental trauma is on to him as well!

Being slim and petite, Heather Locklear was believable in this role, but age-wise a bit long-in-tooth in terms of her age versus the part's. She's also nearly a decade older than her co-star/romantic interest - so perhaps the time's arrived for Heather to enter into more mature roles.One of the others within this comment section termed the Brody character as "brooding." A better adjective couldn't be chosen.No surprise, a made-for -TV ," Lifetime" flick, while set in the U.S., actually filmed in Canada. However, the town of Canmore, Alberta, provided outstanding setting and scenery - and is a place I believe I'd enjoy visiting sometime.The "gal-on-the-run-fleeing-a-past-traumiaic-experience" is one which has been done several times in "Lifetime" and similar genre (perhaps not as frequently as the psychotic neighbor, or spouse with a hidden past, but fairly close).This flick was kind of like an all right - but not sensational - meal, but where there weren't any condiments to ease its blandness.The actors here were all competent, but I realized what the problem was when I could here the audio, but had to be out of view for a couple of times. All films, plays and TV dramas/comedies have rehearsal readings, and sometimes stage presentations are produced with "readings" rather than actors in costume and on-set.The performances in this flick made all of the actors sound like they were doing a reading rather than truly acting in their roles. They did this ably, but there was a wooden, static quality throughout.Give it a 5* - might be one less if weren't for the scenery.

All of you who wrote positive reviews, what movie were you watching? There are so many things wrong with this movie, it would take hours to list them all.I've been reading Nora Roberts' books since her first serial romance way back when. She is a great writer and writes great books. I was somewhat surprised to see her name attached to this movie as a consultant, because if I were her, I'd sue. This movie was awful. The only thing the movie was true to was the characters, location and concept. So much was left out and altered I believe a name change would have prevented me from realizing it was based on the book.Heather Locklear was way too old and I think it was her plastic surgery that got in the way of expression. Other than the freaky flashbacks (which seemed to focus on electric shock therapy that I don't even remember from the book) and the obvious scenes (sleeping in the tub or with a knife) I never bought her as Robert's freaked-out-Reece.Brody was perfectly cast, although they played him much softer than he was in the book (I'm not commenting on the performance just the appearance, as I believe, to a large degree, good or bad acting, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder).The remaining characters didn't play well for me, particularly Lo, and I was disgusted with their pathetic and obvious attempts at distraction using Lo as a red herring. . . just sad. They included so many odd details from the book that never went anywhere in the movie, for instance, Reece kept mentioning the herbs, but nothing ever happened (in the book, Joanie allowed her to purchase some) and the Lo/Linda Gail romance, as abbreviated as it was in the movie, should have been left out as it was distracting and, for someone who read the book, left hanging and useless. Read her books and skip the movies. It was ridiculous, but then I was pretty sure it would be. I won't waste my time with Montana Sky.

I thought Lifetime did a decent job adapting this fantastic novel into a movie. But come on, Heather Locklear? Isn't she a little old for the leading role (and the leading man)? I really enjoyed the Joanie character, but I would have liked to see more of Mac Drubber and Linda-gail. The setting of this film was superb, I loved all the scenic views. But again, I found myself wishing for more. I felt like this film was lacking the relationship between the characters. We probably could have seen more of the "crazy" side of Reece. I was able to watch the whole movie, but the casting was pretty poor. Hopefully the next Nora Roberts film will be better.