This movie is told from the perspective of one of the daughters in the story. Maggie (Leslie Easterbrook) is a bit of a crazypants. She always plays such a good ranting lunatic, a la the ranting scene in The Devil's Rejects. Her husband is Hank (Kane Hodder) who has had about enough of her nonsense and is on the way out the door. She's not having that, but he's out of her life one way or the other. After her husband's sudden departure, and with four kids left to raise on her own, fire-and-brimstone Maggie goes off the deep end. She becomes an alcoholic, and is obsessed with watching a local televangelist who actually sometimes visits her house.
Under the guise of "the Lord," and the preacher spouting "spare the rod and spoil the child," Maggie gets right to work. She starts by beating her children with the "board of education," but quickly forces her daughter into prostitution. Maggie also becomes consumed with her escalating weight, and aging looks, blaming it her younger and more attractive daughters.
Apparently this movie is somewhat based on the story of Theresa Knorr who tortured and murdered her children back in the 80s. Viewers will also draw parallels to The Girl Next Door and the two main women are quite similar. For a fairly low-budget movie ($180K), the camera/sound/quality was great, and the acting wasn't half bad either, especially the fantastic crazy performance by Leslie Easterbrook. The soundtrack was memorable, and that's not something I usually pay attention to when watching a horror movie! I do agree with other reviewers that you have to suspend reality a bit...as all of the kids are teenagers, it does seems a little unbelievable that they were not able to escape or overpower her at any point. But that aside, pretty good flick, and worth checking out!
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