The Cheerleader Murders (2016)

Absolutely Brilliant!

This story has more twists and turns than a second-rate soap opera.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

A clunky actioner with a handful of cool moments.

The plot is so stupid. The acting from the lead actress was not bad. Her performance was only the good thing about this bad & lazy writing lifetime movie. I don't recommend this at tall. The twist was predictable and numb. 1/10

Ellie Davis feels cursed after her sister's possessive ex breaks in and kills her sister, her dad, and then himself. It's 3 years later. She is best friends with fellow cheerleaders Morgan and Dee. Creepy Ben is obsessed with Dee. Morgan flirts with Coach Reeves. Ellie is taken with football quarterback Nicholas. Don is his father. Morgan and Dee go missing. Ellie finds the bloody crime scene. She starts getting mysterious warning messages.Samantha Boscarino is in her early 20s playing 17. That's fairly standard for TV movies. She's perfectly fine otherwise. I can do without the dream sequence especially if they're done poorly. This is par for the course with these TV murder mysteries. The tension couldn't rise too high and the reveal is nothing special.

Here's the set-up… Startlingly full-figured 13-year-old Samantha Boscarino (as Ellie Davis) thinks she is cursed. A van full of partying cheerleaders apparently crashes. Next, a young man appears to expire at a party. Finally, another young man enters Ms. Boscarino's house and shoots half her family. The last shot occurs off camera. That could be a suicide, or an unseen family cat. The important part of what you saw in the opening minutes was the murder of Boscarino's father and sister. The other stuff is part of the curse. Three years later, Boscarino is a sweet 16-year-old high school student. Her cheerleader friends mysteriously disappear and it seems like the curse has returned to frighten Boscarino and quite possibly take her life...The words "Inspired by True Events" introduce this TV movie...It does not seem possible that a real "curse" was at work here and the story offers no evidence. Now and then, a dead character seemingly offers support. Possibly, the curse and its connection to a ghost or imaginary character were clearer in writer Matt Young's original story. Director David Jackson, with Eric Potter's editing, moves "The Cheerleader Murders" around by artfully positioning characters into scenes with surprise and relating events with quick inter-cutting. There is very little to warrant this attention, however. Boscarino is very attractive. Her boyfriend Austin Lyon (as Nicholas "Nic" Ryder) is stable (until his final scene). Devin Crittenden (as Ben Forester) is sufficiently creepy, but you may be better off watching the eyeliner.**** The Cheerleader Murders (4/9/16) David Jackson ~ Samantha Boscarino, Austin Lyon, Tessie Santiago, Devin Crittenden

A father framing his own son for murder and then having the latter commit suicide? A girl losing her father and sister to a deranged boyfriend of the latter and then to fall into a situation where she leaves the house with friends just in time, as the two are subsequently kidnapped and ultimately murdered? All this may be a little too much to comprehend, but it is done well and you wonder throughout this film who the guilty party really is.The tragic young man hints earlier of a curse. Then we have an element of Peyton Place here with the married chemistry teacher having a fling with the coach, who seems to be a suspect at first.O well, remember when school was for education. Not so much so anymore as these films now often depict.