Deadly Delusion (2017 TV Movie) User Reviews

Is she crazy or isn't she...after awhile you no longer care

[katsumibear · 5/10 · 2 December 2018]

These types of movies do have their audience. The type that can sit down for that runtime and handle the back and forth. When done competently, anyone can get invested. In this film however, only few can withstand the tedium of it all. The movie itself isn't bad. You will go along with the ride and question her sanity as well. You will understand her frustration with herself and everyone around her. And then u just won't care and wait for the answer. I won't reveal anything here but stick with it if you started it, you might as well. But overall some will have a good time and others won't. I didn't, but that's just me.

Haylie Duff killed it for me

[carolynocean · 4/10 · 10 February 2021]

I have to say that I was a little cynical even before i watched this movie. Having said that I found myself getting into it , and a little intrigued.

But really , Haylie Duff for the part? Not only can she not act, but she should seriously invest in some acting classes with regard to facial expressions . I could not bear to watch as she trundled along, looking pathetic and weak , and completely overreacting to everything!

At times, I just wanted to scream at her !!!

I did see it through to the end though, it was just ok, not blown away or surprised.

I have seen worse!

Awful ending costly

[r96sk · 5/10 · 2 September 2020]

Awful ending costly.

I was, somewhat, enjoying 'Deadly Delusion' at the beginning, with Haylie Duff giving a strong performance in the lead role. However, not through any fault of her's, the film gets weaker and weaker and weaker, culminating in such a shoddy and forced conclusion. The actual concept of the end isn't actually a terrible one, though the way it's just thrown together without proper explanation or meaning is poor.

The acting talent, including Duff, is actually pretty good - a vast improvement on a lot of made-for-TV productions at least. Interesting to see Teri Polo make an appearance, too.

If the writing was better then I may have liked, or at least not disliked, this. Unfortunately, that ending derailed everything.

A 3 just for the storyline

[dzzydreamer · 3/10 · 28 March 2020]

I don't even know what to say. I can't believe I finished this movie. I've rated a lot of movies on here but I think this is my first written review. The story/premise of the movie is promising and it could've turned out better, but the main character overacted too much. It just made it so unbelievable that a guy would be sticking it out with her when she can barely go outside without looking like a dog whose owner is holding a rolled newspaper over its head. That is what she looks like throughout the whole movie. Cringing and wide eyed and flighty or crying and breaking down for the whole movie. It was too much. Most people would try and act more normal than this in real life even if they thought they were delusional. I get it's a lifetime movie and I don't expect much usually as the storylines and acting are not up to par with most films - but go ahead and skip this one.

Awful and boring

[halkatla-77828 · 1/10 · 5 August 2018]

I think this movie could have worked if they had gone with a better actress. Or just any other actress. Haylie Duff is so bad that she´s in a category all on her own. From the first moments when she is on screen every facial expression she makes is awful and made me wish for something extremely terrible to happen to her. Yes, she was playing a character who looked like a horse with the worst personality you could imagine. It´s impossible to have any sympathy for such a person when the actress is this bad.

I liked this one!

[haroot_azarian · 21 September 2023]

So I am on the fence regarding Haylie Duff. She has done some bad movies. But as some other contributors said, I think she killed it with this one. She was also good in the Bachelor Next Door.

She played the role of someone with mental health issues who is struggling with what's real and what's not perfectly.

SPOILERS: So the movie is about an underground snuff filmmaking ring. But we do not find this out until about two-thirds into the movie.

Mike Faiola played the part of the villlian quite well. He did it again in Fatal Flip starring Dominique Swaine and Tatiana Ali.

I agree with one contributor who said the ending was pretty bad. Yes, if the cops arrest the producer/director of the movie (Mandylor) alongside all the cameras and footage etc. And he and the fake real estate guy confess and cooperate I am pretty sure they would also nab the psychiatrist who is the groomer of potential victims of the snuff movies ring.

Anyway I quite liked this Lifetime movie.

Oh Dear

[svader · 1/10 · 1 September 2020]

What have I just watched.

Nonsense to the extreme.

What is more disappointing is that a simply plotted film cannot be followed by some of the reviewers ??????

@lavatch Shane is dead. He has not risen from the dead. The guy at the end of the film is a completely different actor and not the same actor that plays Shane.

@nikeynike the girl that is leaving the psych unit is the next "victim".

Hope this helps. Please watch the film before leaving a review. It does help

Haylie Duff is great in this!

[jasmineayouby · 7/10 · 14 June 2023]

I only watched for Haylie Duff and she did not disappoint! She perfectly portrayed the "delusional" Julia, she has me guessing until the very end. Every time you think she's imagining it, something happens and you think she might not be. It was very well done, I suspected everyone in the movie EXCEPT Shane. I thought the psychiatrist & real estate guy were creepy. I even suspected her friend Annie of being in on it and possibly getting her the house/job as a set-up. But I definitely didn't see the end coming.

Haylie did AMAZING, I love that she trusted herself and kept going with her instinct and she knew what she was seeing was REAL.

Scary to think this is based on a true story; I am glad this story was shared to remind others not to be so trusting..

What I don't understand

[nikeynike · 5/10 · 25 February 2019]

Well I liked the movie but at the end there's a young lady exiting the psychiatric ward and its a different face confusing. Was that supposed to be Haylie Duff?

Great Movie- Unrealistic Ending

[hoops-53436 · 7/10 · 18 June 2022]

I would have given this movie a 10 if it wasn't for the ending. Great plot and, in my POV, Haylie Duff delivered a powerful performance- one of the best. We had the boyfriend and real estate guy figured out early but never would have guessed the reason they were gaslighting her until near the end. In this computer age, a setup like that is very imaginable.

Haylie played the victim nicely- almost falling apart at times but holding it together at some important times. Guts and grit.

The ending let down everything the film had created. When the cops got the real estate guy and the boss and found all the computers and wiring and cameras in the house, they would have thoroughly investigated all the players, including the doctor (who we figured out was evil at her very first appearance.) Oh, but that's right, Lifetime always makes the cops into bumbling idiots, so the ring continues even though the bosses are gone and the doctor would have at least gotten spooked by the arrests and breaking up of the ring. Sad.

Oops... I did it again

[romodomo · 2/10 · 10 July 2022]

Maybe I am a masochistt... In my humble opinion Hayley Duff is NEVER a good actor, She spoils every and each film , I am always wonderig why they think she is cut out for acting. Neither is she pretty. Anyway, I am just watching the film to see if she proves me wrong. The bad reviews donot frighten me, either... After the movie It wasn't that bad, if not the miserable faces and gestures of the main actress. The end was quite surprising.

Haylie Duff Does It Again in Deadly Delusion

[Reel_Reviews · 10/10 · 22 March 2018]

Julia, who had a good childhood until the murder of her parents, on, what seems, a spiral downfall in her adult life. When her boyfriend gets a well paying executive job at a movie studio, she and he lease a house in upscale Los Angeles. Julia and her boyfriend Shane hopes the movie to a new place will help Julie with her issues, mainly her delusions of someone always after her.

Julia (Haylie Duff, The Bachelor Next Door, Bad Twin, His Secret Family) has been suffering nightmare, both in sleep and waking hours, of someone after her. When she tries to tell her boyfriend Shane (Mike Faiola, Psycho In-Law, Awkward TV series, Bones TV series) he thinks she has delusions for the person she claims is after her can never be found. Shane has been supporting Julia with her delusions while Julia is seeing a mental doctor named Dr. Leary (played by Teri Polo, The Fosters TV series, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit).

Shane is able to obtain a nice house in upscale Los Angels through his boss while getting a promotion at work as an executive at a movie studio, as already mentioned. This house is in a new city for Julia, in which Shane hopes will allow her to focus on her job as a fashion photographer while giving her a new place to help with her recovery. Her doctor is just a video conference away, which Shane insists she contacts when she's feeling a bit off.

DIFFERENT PLACE, SAME DELUSIONS The delusions, or illusions, Julia has of someone after her don't slow down, but rather, seem to be getting worse. She constantly in video conferences with Dr. Leary and calling her husband at work throughout the day. The illusions aren't just of people after her, but of snakes in her bathroom and noises, she hears in the house.

Shane, being the ever loving boyfriend, tries to assure Julia that there isn't anything going on. When she tells him someone is in the house, he checks to find no one there. When Julia feels they are being watched, he proves to her that that's not true either, even when she begins pulling the Network cable from the ceiling claiming it's a cable to a hidden video camera. The cable, he tells her, is to the TV and he shows her. Everything Julia says or shows Shane, he is able to show or tell her the opposite

NOT EVERYTHING IS AT IT SEEMS As with Mistress Hunter, this movie had a lot going on as far as twists. When Julia does some snooping on her own because she knows she's not crazy, she discovers a lot of secrets, which only has us, the viewers, wondering what's going on. But the more Julia learns the more we think we're going to crazy.

The delusions or illusions (however you want to label them) are real for Julia, but not by way of her mind playing tricks on her. They are man-made illusions but the reason for the mind games is very surprising and makes you wonder about people as if I don't wonder about them as it is.

FINAL THOUGHT I love me some Haylie Duff, the older sister of Hillary Duff. Ever since I saw her in His Secret Family (2015), I have watched all of her psychological movies on LifetimeTV or Lifetime Movie Network. I think she's a fantastic actress and she doesn't disappoint in Deadly Delusion aka The Lease. Haylie brings her characters to life to where you feel what they are feeling and want to help. When someone wrongs her in a movie you want to help her get even with that person. This is the type of actress she is.

Haylie made this movie for me. It's one of the reasons I watched it. But when the twists started coming about and the final twist happened at the end, I put this movie on top of my list of another great movie from Lifetime. I saved this movie on my DVR, as I did with Mistress Hunter, to watch again.

Deadly Delusion aka The Lease is currently playing on LifetimeTV and must see.

Slow Burner & Confusing Plot Details

[lavatch · 3/10 · 23 April 2020]

"Deadly Delusion" (a.k.a., "The Lease") was a film with an intriguing premise. A woman constantly lives in fear of her life with delusions of being stalked by a scary looking man. When Julia ("Jules") McNeil and her husband Shane move to L.A., they have a beautiful home awaiting them. Julia and Shane only have to sign the lease and then let the good times roll! Unfortunately, the new home turns into a nightmare for Jules.

Is the protagonist paranoid? Or, is she being set up by nefarious forces? The filmmakers keep us guessing about this key issue. The only problem is that they string the paranoia theme out far too long. The sluggish pace and the absence of clues about who would want to torment Jules lie at the center of the flaws in the screenplay.

The exposition of the film was also sloppy, as we did not learn enough of the family tragedy of Jules that made her so psychologically fragile in the first place. There is also confusion with regard to Jules' friend Annie, who at one point in the film confesses that Jules had saved her life when they lived in New York. Again, no explanation is given for this strand of the plot.

More than anything, the film's biggest disappointment was the denouement. It would appear that Shane returns from the dead to prey upon another victim who is being discharged from a mental asylum. It is clear for the first time that the appropriately named psychiatrist Dr. Leary, who is on call 24/7 to minister to her patients, was in on the plot all along. But it is completely confusing how Shane could have risen from the grave after being shot in the heart. For an intricately plotted film about shadow men, details should matter!

Haylie Duff as Haylie Duff

[CranberriAppl · 18 June 2022]

I've probably seen all of HD's Lifetime flicks, and honestly, she's the same character in each movie. I always see her. Now I know you're saying, it's Lifetime, what do you expect, but I certainly think she could probably switch it up sometimes. If it's a "thriller," she's always a tightly wound, anxious, ball of nerves. Her Christmas movies have the same issue where it's always Haylie Duff and not any given character.

All that said...it's not a bad movie. The storyline is a bit dark and a stretch, but if one watches within the context of the universe they set up, you just gotta roll with it. The opening scene is very dramatic and sets the tone and you will question whether or not she's crazy or being driven crazy. I think the supporting cast (some of who I recognize from Hallmark) do a good job of enough ambiguity so that you can't tell if the movie is being played straight OR if she's being gaslit (like the movie Gaslight). Going back to Haylie Duff...after a while you're going to get annoyed by her because the character's mood is always on eleven.

I won't spoil the ending, and it's not a must watch, but like another contributor said...if you watch past a certain point, you'll feel compelled to finish the movie. It's one of those movies where it's either A or B, so on the off chance someone wants to guess what happens, I won't say much more. Even though the movie's old.

Teri Polo is wasted here, but her role is more or less a cameo so easy money I guess.

Pretty Awful

[Picgoer · 4/10 · 22 January 2024]

I initially thought that this might be an interesting film and settled down with a cuppa on a winter afternoon, prepared to be reasonably entertained, however I was to be disappointed. It proved a very unconvincing film and the acting wasn't great. I also wondered why a photographer, so convinced her experiences were real never had a camera with her to take pictures to prove her experiences? A picture speaks a thousand words! The flags were flying as to who the 'baddies' were particularly the movie director! So there wasn't much that seemed surprising. Having said that it wasn't meant to be Shakespeare so it met its brief!

This was PAINFUL to get through

[AnnPanders · 1/10 · 14 May 2023]

Hailey Duff was absolutely cringeworthy in this. I'm not sure I've ever seen her act before, but girl, you were awful in this. To the point that if I ever see that she's starring in something I will avoid it like a plague.

The only way that I got through this was that I was playing on the internet and if it sounded like something interesting was happening I'd turn back to it. I just couldn't stand looking at Duff and her trying to act pathetic. Did I mention how horrible her acting was?

I suppose with a better actress this would have been infinitely better. It was kind of an interesting premise.

But it was practical TORTURE witnessing how terrible an actress Duff is.

Really an Awesome Movie

[kishorkure · 8/10 · 3 August 2020]

This movie shows the bitter but hidden and very much dangerous mentality of criminals. I was shocked watching its end.

Great movie for a change, lifetime!

[psywizard880 · 9/10 · 10 November 2018]

I absolutely loved this movie. It had me on the edge of my seat. Never saw the movie like test with this type of story line. Terry Paulo played an excellent part, and so does Hailey Duff. I think from the beginning of the movie when you see her with that expression on her face that's all you need to know. Well thought out of Motive. I think Haley Duff is perfect for this type a part