Deadly Exchange (2017) User Reviews

Really?

[patswhatsup51 · 5/10 · 28 December 2017]

I'm sorry. I'm not one to take time out to voice my opinion about such tripe. The storyline is not so bad. But the acting is horrendous. Especially the dimwit who plays the part of Chloe. The actors' lines are delivered half-heartedly. Yet I continued to watch this cheesy excuse for a movie. Kind of like not being able to take your eyes off a train wreck. Which is quite an apropos analogy.

I was feeling it until...

[katsumibear · 4/10 · 2 December 2018]

We've seen these movies before. They all follow a formula but we keep coming back because on a rainy day we enjoy turning our brain off and rolling with the predictability. But GOD no one could predict how utterly incompetent everyone in this movie was. The joy from rolling with it turned into complete frustration at the stupidity even on the villain's part. And now.......heavy spoilers so beware.......you have been warned. And now after Jack's death, I am reeling at the only person with any common sense being taken out so quickly. I thought they would at least go with the coma angle. Anyway I got over it but then came the investigation. For a detective to even suspect the daughter over the monster that she questioned who's answers clearly weren't holding up is when I completely tuned out. This movie is a rage and a half. And why is everyone punching in security codes in clear view. Why even bother having them then. As a person that can even laugh at how bad these movies are sometimes, this wasn't funny. Not even a little bit. Oh and one last thing. Why is the detective that caused them grief even invited to the daughter's graduation party? Whatever anyway if you've seen it, you know what I mean and if you haven't, don't bother, you won't be able to just relax with this one.

People, this is an art form called MELODRAMA!

[vnssyndrome89 · 5/10 · 30 June 2023]

Deadly Exchange (2017) TV Movie

BASIC PLOT: Samantha & Blake Winters have had a hard couple of years. Samantha (Lindsay Hartley) lost her husband, and Blake (Victoria Konefal) lost her sister. They both are starting to feel like they have their feet back on the ground again, and as part of the healing process, they decide to try to help someone else. The student foreign exchange program feels right, and they decide to take in a girl from England, Chloe Miller (Valentina Novakovic). She seems like a perfect fit, but as things keep going wrong, they wonder, is Chloe as perfect as she seems?

WHAT WORKS: *Rhys Matthew Bond plays Blake's boyfriend, Jack. He's smart, nerdy and sees what no one else can. His hang dog facial expressions convey his heartbreak, and his anger. He does a great job here.

*The over-the-top score is great, it's diabolical in all the right places.

*There are three types of movies on Lifetime. This is the second type, melodrama. According to dictionary. C o m, the definition of MELODRAMA is "a dramatic form that does not observe the laws of cause and effect and that exaggerates emotion and emphasizes plot or action at the expense of characterization."

In other words, this is MELODRAMA. The characters are not so well defined, but their motives are. If you watch this movie with that in mind, you'll like it a whole lot more. You're not supposed to take the over-the-top motives or performances too seriously, it's pure entertainment. STOP LOOKING FOR EMMYS FROM LIFETIME MOVIES!

WHAT DOESN'T WORK: *Rose Cooney aka Chloe Miller (Valentina Novakovic) does not look like a high school senior. She's a lovely woman, with a woman's body, NOT a high school girl's body. They should have avoided bathing suits, but even then, she still looks too old.

*Jack's death doesn't really work here. As someone who is all too familiar with grief, this would be too much for this family. Finding a loved one's dead body, especially from a violent end, is the worst thing. They lost their husband/father and their sister/daughter 2 years ago. Blake spent a year in a mental facility after losing her twin, you don't deal with these kinds of losses easily. Along comes Jack, who rescues Blake from her depression, and has been her boyfriend for over a year. He 'kills himself' in their pool, and we're supposed to believe they recover and move on? It would have been better to isolate him (coma), and bring him back at the end.

*I love Cynthia Watros as a detective. She did a great job as Detective Cynthia Wilson on Finding Carter (2014), a show that should have gone on for additional seasons. She continues that type of role here, as Detective Hardy. But it's not her embodiment of the character that doesn't work, it's her behavior. She interrupts Jack's funeral by forcing Blake to go to the police station. Samantha is dating a lawyer, Scott (Jason-Shane Scott) who witnesses this. He would advise her not to cooperate, or at least be in the interview room with Samantha & Blake. She refuses to believe Samantha, even with proof. This does not work, no cop would open the department up to liability claims by not listening, and filling an Amber Alert.

*Samantha believes Chloe's set up of Scott too easily. I know this is a melodrama, but the setup needs to be more convincing, especially since Samantha already doesn't trust Chloe. It would have been better if they realized it was a set up, and worked together to stop her (which is what happens later anyway).

*Where does Chloe get chloroform from? Come on, it's not like you can buy it from the corner store.

*I think escape, instead of capture would have worked better here. An open ended thriller (sequel?) instead of a saccharine happy ending.

*Journalist Ruth Hill (Joanne Baron) is going with Chloe (Valentina Novakovic) to the library for an interview. At 41:07 Ruth has her hat on backwards, they cut to Chloe, then back to Ruth, and at 41:23 it's on forward again.

TO RECOMMEND, OR NOT TO RECOMMEND, THAT IS THE QUESTION: *I like Lindsay Hartley & Jason-Shane Scott as a writing team. Most of their outings are enjoyable melodramas. This one goes off the rails a bit, but it is still a decent outing.

IF you can understand the art form that is melodrama, and you like that type of entertainment, you might like this. It's a bit much, even for melodrama though. If you are looking for lots of believable characters and motives in your TV movies, then give this a pass.

CLOSING NOTES: *This is a Made-For-TV movie, please keep that in mind before you watch\rate it. TV movies have a much lower budget, and so your expectations should be adjusted.

*I have no connection to the film, or production in ANY way. I am just an honest viewer, who wishes for more straight forward reviews. Hope I helped you out.

Would Not Recommend

[kmartensen · 3/10 · 17 July 2019]

Awful storyline was matched by dreadful acting. Started with an interesting exposition, but began to fall apart as the film progressed.

Utter rubbish and all been done before - and better

[Janet1612 · 1/10 · 24 August 2020]

Watching this whilst feeling unwell lying on the sofa. It actually cheered me up as it was so bad, the acting, the cheesy script, the predictable story.

Mum is all teeth ginormous eyelashes, enhanced body parts including those awful blown up lips - sadly her poor acting ability didn't help distract.

Blake was mini mum; enhanced body parts and an even poorer actor

I'm not sure where Chloe was supposed to have come from, but it certainly wasn't England with that accent- Australia via South Africa?

Scott was another all teeth and tan - what is with this film productions, they just want actors who are unreal without a hair out of place and with no acting ability.

I love it that the detective was at the graduation party (with a joke graduation outfit worn by Blake), were they short of guests or cast members

I also laughed out loud at the detective telling mum and clone earlier about Jack's 'suppos-ed' suicide. Yes pronounced just like that. Mum and clone even repeat 'suppos-ed? Did this film win a raspberry award ? It should also have won the cheese award.

Oh my God

[carnstabba-55672 · 1/10 · 18 October 2019]

It's hard to imagine that a film could just get steadily worse when it had reached what I thought was rock bottom in the first 10 minutes! Some of the worst acting I've seen in years-5 year olds Nativity plays are more adult. Have now decided if the 'lead character ' is really British I being a Brit feel totally ashamed. Avoid this so called film at all costs.

The two adult actors wrote this

[CranberriAppl · 14 May 2021]

I like Lindsay H and I like Jason-Shane Scott. I wasn't a fan of Passions, but I watched OLTL and was a huge fan. They both have Lifetime acting and writing credits under their belts and from IMDb, I can see they are a writing duo. Which is cool. To not even check this person's background is just absurd. It's an overused plot device and defies all logic. Most importantly, it always gets 1-2 characters killed. At a minimum. I was an exchange student in high school and my parents hosted. It was quite the process through our school, so no random agency could just send kids over or into people's homes. Come on. Surely there was a better way to set this up. The gullibility of characters gets people killed. It's tiresome and a bit insulting if it's a case of the villain getting away in the end (waiting to see if that happens here). My point is that these two writer/actors even having control over the script are still doing the things that we get sick of. Not to mention it's very rare that Lifetime justifies how the villain latches on to their victims. In The Hand that Rocks the Cradle, there was no mistaking why Peyton wanted to ruin Claire's life specifically. Unless I missed it, I have yet to see how or why Rose/Chloe went through the trouble and latched on to a mom and daughter in another country. Come on. I made it to the villain monologue and it's not good enough.

I'm over people dying in these movies and no one caring. People die and the characters move on so fast. No one notifies the family. Although in this one it looks like one dead character has a family...wow that's a change from the usual, but another victim is glossed over. Speaking of victims, you have this huge house, a pool...someone gets murked on your property but no alarm system? No flood lights that sense someone in your backyard?

You know what you're getting with Lifetime, but sometimes it's just too ridiculous. Basically at least two (I've got an hour to go) people died because mom Samantha let a stranger live with her. A stranger who not only killed but also falsely accused a man of violating her. So wrong.

Who Wrote This ?

[carolynocean · 2/10 · 30 October 2021]

Am I the only one who is tired of watching these monotonous movies .

Same old story , unstable girl moves in , nobody notices that, since she arrived the body count starts to rise !, And the worrying thing is nobody cares for more than five minutes .

Glam " all teeth and eyes " Mom is so stupid , until the last fifteen minutes, when the penny finally drops, and she realises that she has a nut job in her house , and then suddenly turns into Super Mom , minus the cape , single handedly chasing nut job and taking her down !

What a bore, seen it all before.

Did I mention that the acting is bad ?

Satisfying thriller

[missraze · 3/10 · 27 April 2021]

The scene span between the exchange student pushing the boyfriend of her exchange host family's daughter in the pool when he can't swim, all the way to the boyfriend's murder and the host mom discovering his body, was a solid viewing. The build up was engaging, the murder was clever, and the acting when they discover him dead was actually great. People are insulting Lindsay Hartley but she is a good actress. She's also pretty. But her name does NOT match her face and she should never play a mom unless it's a mother to a small child. She should change her name to something and pick roles that match her exotic and erotic look. She thinks it might make things easier for her to have an Americanized name but it's making things harder. It's making her look misplaced with casting. She needs to play a villain for once, femme fatale, a detective, the other woman, the seductress, the mean boss, the step-mom, a primadonna, a company upstart, the clever ex out for revenge. The mom to a grown woman, the happy newlywed and the insecure employee roles that I've seen her in don't work for her look regardless of her talent and clearly it's bothering people. The woman who played the detective in this film should have played the mom and "Hartley" should have played the detective. Who is the casting director... The mom role is more lines so Hartley selfishly took it I guess.

Chloe as a role is great. But the actress can't figure out if she's from London or Sydney, Australia or a boarding school in Canada. Since the girl is a liar with a fake identity, her hometown is a blur but regardless she's supposed to be English from Canterbury. It's southeast England like a central London accent. Pretty simple stuff. It's not cockney. It's not brummie. It's not scouse. It's not Geordie. It's not Irish. It's central London. She lucked out here. Her nonexistent application of the accent throughout sentences except inconsistent emphasis on the same single words and phrases like "thought, talk, of course, all, can't, more, there" and her atrocious over but under pronunciation of a main character's name Scott as "Skoat" screams amateur drama club audition accent. Like how someone talks when they are clueless about accents. Again who is the casting director... She's not British is she? *Chloe's accent* Na. Uhv coos nawt. Ah cawnt. Plays geev me a chawns. It was Skoat. Then she pronounced MUM as a soft "mom." So you pronounce Scott as Skoat and can't as cawnt but mum as MOM?!

The scene where Chloe frames Scott or Skoat, the host mom's awesome boyfriend, was hilarious. Rather than upsetting or climaxing to the mystery unraveling, it cracked me up. She sets him up. She put the naughty photos on his phone and her "knickers" in his coat. When "Hartley" pulls the knickers out and shows Skoat, I'm sorry but I laughed so loud from the deepest part of my core. Was it supposed to be anything other than funny, I'm sorry... I think even they were sighing through this production but acting is fun and good money, right, so who cares how bad the film is lol

This rating started at a 7/10 but with ten minutes left, I leave this rating with a 3. Sorry. Or as Chloe would say, in a Canadian accent even though she's British... Soarry.

Did not like the lady playing the Mom.

[asrichmond · 10/10 · 12 March 2018]

I liked the movie. Good story line. Not your typical Lifetime movie and I watch quite a few! The only problem I had was I did not like the actor who played the mom. I think it was the inflated clown lips that made her not look normal. I don't know why women ruin their faces like that.

Watchable but predictable

[nicholls_les · 3/10 · 13 July 2022]

They must have a template for these movies as there are so many with similar story lines. The acting wasn't bad but it was very predictable. Even the ending fight in the woods has been done a million times.

And that British accent? No one talks like Mary Poppins.

Missing cast

[italiandlite55 · 3/10 · 11 March 2018]

Not showing who's playing the detective. Please add all cast.

The only good thing

[svader · 2/10 · 24 August 2020]

The only thing this movie has going for it is Valentina's attributes. Other than that is is boring cross.

Over acting if it can be called that rubbish storyline and dumb characters.

Totally cringe

[ciravieira · 1/10 · 6 September 2023]

I saw this movie now and this is terrible.

The basic script, the cringy and exaggerated acting, the filter that looks like I saw from a Twilight movie, everything that I saw is so predictable that everyone will see is literally obvious of what's going to happen And even worse is the acting of Rose Cooney, that doesn't even look like the mean, evil smart girl like The Orphan, but more like a lazy, lame, exaggerated Harley Quinn.

Everything, that I saw in this movie is so artificial, unrealistic and even fake, that it makes me don't want to watch it anymore or again. That's it for all. Thank you.

The Perfect Houseguest

[lavatch · 8/10 · 12 September 2019]

Throughout this film and so many of the Lifetime motion pictures, the characters fail to think for themselves. Is that a convention of this style of filmmaking? Or, is it a troubling pattern of behavior in our culture today?

In the case of "Deadly Exchange," a well-intentioned mother, Samantha, accepts too much at face value about the exchange student Chloe without verifying it the young woman's identity prior to inviting her into her home. One thing leads to another, and a psychopathic killer is on the loose because of her background as an orphan whose mother was killed by a deranged boyfriend.

There is a motto that Chloe lives by in this film, which is "That's how this works." The way things "work" for Chloe is to mastermind her evil doings, deciding to stop anyone in her way with murder as a last resort. To this goal, Chloe relies on the gullibility of her victims.

The actress playing Samantha also had a hand in the screenplay of "Deadly Change" that included an interesting set of characters. But a major theme of the film was the compliant nature of characters who never stopped to think about their choices and to allow themselves to be manipulated by a clever hustler.

Outstanding Performances

[Kristamw · 10/10 · 10 November 2018]

Character Development/Writing Quality: Lindsay Hartley (Samantha) continues to prove her acting savvy; she seamlessly slips into the role of a mother, exhibiting a natural and woman-next-door appeal that is endearing. Once she realizes what her foreign exchange student, Chloe, is up to, her kind demeanor immediately shifts into defensive protective parent who will not stand for her twisted tactics. Chloe's character is skillfully handled by Valentina Novakovic as she goes from a seemingly harmless guest to a swiftly evil-minded girl whose goal is to make Samantha become the "mum" she lost ten years ago, when her mother's boyfriend killed her. The lengths she goes to make this happen are outrageous, of course, and she wears the role of a deceiving psychotic well. The story itself is not anything unprecedented, but it does hold your attention as Chloe manages to find cruel tricks to play at every turn. Values: The mother-daughter bond between Samantha and her daughter Blake is sealed tightly. Samantha's boyfriend refuses to give in to Chloe's attempts at seduction. Blake is good friends with Jake--when he recognizes that Chloe purposely pushes him in a pool, knowing he can't swim, he vows to ensure that the truth is revealed to everyone else. His care for Chloe is strong and dependable. Content (sex, language & violence): Chloe's revealing chest in a picture. Minimal language. Violence is strong at the opening and minimal throughout. Scare factor: The deadly things Chloe does; the opening scene depicting her mother being killed. Overall, a strongly plotted story with excellent performances by the two leads.