I should have known that with a name like Secret Obsession that this new Netflix film was going to be rough…like Lifetime level rough. And it was! The fact that it was also starring basically dormant actress, Brenda Song (of Disney fame), should have also tipped me off. My sister was dying to see it, so I gave it the benefit of the doubt. It’s an hour and a half I’ll never get back, but sadly, I have seen worse.
The movie starts with Song’s character, Jennifer, running for her life from someone. She almost gets away until a car smashes into her. She wakes up with some memory loss, but thankfully her husband, Russell, is there. He gives her a photo album of their life’s memories, and takes her back to her beautiful and remote home in the woods. Russell’s actions are a little off, and Jennifer notices that some of the photographs have been doctored. It doesn’t help that his actions get a little weirder, and that your favorite Allstate spokesperson is the detective on the case. He just won’t stop digging!
Once some dots start getting connected, the acting gets super corny and laughable, but you also gets some decaying corpses. Jennifer may have a banged up ankle, but her lack of fighting back is so pathetic she almost deserves it. We find out those corpses belong to her parents and real husband, and that Russell is actually Ryan, a former co-worker who was obsessed (see what they did there) with Jennifer. Ultimately, Allstate guy and Jennifer get the best of Ryan, and three months later we see Jennifer packing up her life and trying to move on.
Like I said, obscenely corny acting, and laughable dialogue. Towards the end I asked my sister, “on a scale on 1 to Lifetime, how bad is this movie?” She ranked it up there, and I wonder if Lifetime maybe made some serious bucks selling this over to Netflix. Netflix, just because you can buy something, doesn’t mean it should ever air. Just saying.