A Surrogate's Nightmare (2017 TV Movie) User Reviews

Emily Tennant was great, Great actors disappointing PLOT/No closure

[countofjers · 4/10 · 28 August 2017]

So let me get this right..

this whole premise is about a lady who lied about her high school bf raping her, got him 9 YEARS in jail, lies about their daughter and has her daughter's husband use her (THE MOTHER) as a surrogate when she never told the truth about lying about being RAPED by a guy that never raped her lol what the f**k is this. and the dude goes back to jail OR has therapy HYPOTHETICALLY and she lives on happy EVER AFTER WHAT THE F**K ... FEMINIST BARF

This was a confusing story

[phoenixinvictus · 4/10 · 5 May 2018]

This was a confusing story that made me feel sorrier for Curt than for Angela. Angela's estranged mother is murdered and she returns to help her sister. She then volunteers in a very "nonchalant" way to be a surrogate for her sister who is unable to have children. Meanwhile Angela casually goes on a date with Curt whom she unjustly accused of raping her which is odd if not downright insane... oh and when a drunk customer is being a jerk to the restaurant receptionist and Curt defends her Angela screams out at the top of her lungs to stop because he has a criminal record. That was a humiliating if not insulting thing to say because it was Angela's lies that caused him to have a record.

It never occurred to her to clear his name and set the record straight? I'm just saying... Curt is the real victim here who got nine years in prison. Sure, Curt goes crazy but I can't blame him. The impression that I got was that Angela wasn't even aware that she even had a child until the doctor "reminded" her that she had been a mother... I guess it just slipped her mind.

Curt then goes back to jail again or has therapy but the most important thing of all seems to have been forgotten: Angela's mother's murderer! We assume that Curt killed her but the audience is never told for sure and he never confesses to the crime.

"(You're) Having My Baby" what a wonderful way of saying how much I love you

[Ed-Shullivan · 6/10 · 17 April 2022]

Paul Anka wrote and sang this song back in 1974 and this Lifetime story tells about the highs and the lows about the difficulties and the pure joy of how a pregnancy can affect not just the mother and father's lives, but other people's lives as well. Poppy Montgomery plays the big sister and surrogate mom for her little sister's infertility problems and the husband who is trying to climb the corporate ladder and have a baby at the same time. No doubt a pregnancy can be a blessing and/or a curse and we have all heard the stories from both ends of the spectrums by which some women try in vain to get pregnant and other girls just have to open the top button of their blouse and "Voila'" they are pregnant.

This is an above average Lifetime movie that is worth watching. I give it a 6 out of 10 IMDb rating.

So the one whose lies..

[CranberriAppl · 29 October 2021]

Put the events of this movie in motion, is the victor? I only kept this movie on after seeing the cast (Lifetime was airing a surrogate's marathon) and was completely let down.

How exactly did A atone or take responsibility for her actions all these years? Oh yeah she didn't. Lifetime frequently does this: there's a person whose life is destroyed by someone else, the innocent person is driven to do something criminal (usually murder), so now the destroyer's actions are less bad in comparison and we're supposed to root for the destroyer.

This movie should have not killed off grandma/mom and then held her responsible and allowed the original wronged party to get *** life back.

I won't watch again.

What a waste of talented actors

[rosey-14 · 5/10 · 25 June 2021]

The lead actors in this are all capable of much more than this. It's poorly written, with gaping plot flaws. Poor Ty Olssen, a handsome enigmatic actor reduced to this tripe. The two lead females have done so much better and are worth so much more.

Doesn't anyone else find the accent work incredibly distracting?

[laurenbjerk · 7/10 · 22 April 2022]

Am I alone here?

This is the first Poppy Montgomery film I've watched. And Regardless of anything else going on in this motion picture, this accent is a mess.

average Lifetime

[SnoopyStyle · 5/10 · 19 December 2020]

Shelley (Emily Tennant) is devastated when someone pushes her mother off a cliff although she and everyone believes that she accidentally fell. Her older sister novelist Angela (Poppy Montgomery) visits from New York. Shelley and David cannot have children. Angela volunteers to be the surrogate and reconnects with Curt.

I would think that the surrogate should be the younger sister. That seems to make more sense as a medical issue. Mostly, this movie struggles to gain any tension. The mystery of the killer seems to be a matter of writer's choice. There are two obvious suspects. One is logical. The other needs a whole lot of exposition at the end of the movie to explain. Neither is that compelling. This is a Lifetime thriller of average quality.

Same old, same old... but actually a surprise reveal at the end

[toby2458 · 7/10 · 24 March 2021]

Why can't I turn away from these movies? So predictable with so many head scratching moments. But I was surprised by the reveal! Didn't really expect that!

* why does everything have to be "it's complicated"? I get it now (with the reveal at the ending) why it was complicated that she left but why was it complicated to tell her ex that she was carrying a baby for her sister and brother in law?

* they think he was on his phone when the accident happened? They didn't notice the fresh damage to the back and side of the car?

* Her husband is waking up and she decides to leave the hospital?

Am I The Only One Who Felt Bad For Curt?

[callahan-92815 · 6/10 · 3 March 2023]

As a Ty Olsson fan, I wanted to check this movie out. Overall, this was your pretty typical type of Lifetime film. One of those movies you put on on a lazy weekend day or snow day or something like that.

The ending REALLY threw me for a loop! In many cases, the endings to these kinds of movies are predictable and pretty cliche, but in this case, there was a real twist, which was pretty interesting. I went from feeling sorry for Curt, to thinking he was a bad guy, then back to feeling sorry for him. I'm not excusing what he did (David, for example), and yes he needed to answer for that, but one could say that he was probably driven to it. To be falsely accused of a crime that heinous, and to have to serve time for it (where he was probably horribly abused), is terrible! And then to find out that he had a daughter on top of that?! No wonder he was unstable! After that, I found myself absolutely hating Angela and the mother.

The acting in this movie was decent overall...Olsson was excellent, as he is in everything he's in, but the rest I would say were good. Not great.

Like I said, this is a decent lazy-day movie...I'll watch it again.

Watch it through to the end

[phd_travel · 8/10 · 9 August 2017]

Sometimes what makes a Lifetime movie is the ending and in this case the ending is quite unexpected and strangely feel good.

An older sister agrees to be the surrogate for her younger sister who is reproductively challenged. Meanwhile she hooks up with an ex who get s bit obsessed with her.

The 2 actresses Poppy Montgomery and Emily Tennant look alike even though they have different hair color so it's quite convincing.

The only thing is there is a bit of injustice at the end which seems brushed aside.

***1/2

[edwagreen · 9/10 · 25 March 2017]

The excellent shocking ending makes this a must see film.

When there mother dies, two sisters, the younger married, reunite and soon the older one becomes a surrogate for her married sister who is unable to have children.

From the beginning, we see that the mother met with foul play while jogging and our older sister begins to suspect her brother-in-law who has been acting strangely since this all occurred.

The older sister played by Poppy Montgomery was estranged from her mother and became a writer and toured the world. In the meantime, she begins a relationship with an old flame who we soon learn is an ex-convict.

The details of why he went to prison and who the sisters really are in relationship to one another shall pull you off your seat.

Film builds to a crescendo as the shocking secret is revealed in the end. In the meantime, her ex-beau has become a raving lunatic with mayhem pursuing.

Emily grows up

[DavidSKS · 10/10 · 28 August 2017]

I was impressed by Emily Tennant when she finally received the opportunity to play an adult. I loved her portraying a teenager in such films as "Triple Dog", "Text to Kill" and "Driven Underground", and later "Daughter for Sale", which came out a few months after this one. Given the chance to play a character closer to her real-life age, Emily comes through with a strong, heartfelt performance.

We don't see enough of Poppy Montgomery these days. Of course she was great in "Without a Trace", and I thought highly of her performance in "Murder in the Hamptons", which has been shown on Lifetime networks quite a bit in the last 12 years. She was superb playing Angela, the titular surrogate who is mercilessly stalked by her creepy ex (Ty Olsson).

Great plot. Even greater performances by Ms. Tennant and Ms. Montgomery.

The Most Complicated Family on the Planet

[lavatch · 8/10 · 21 September 2019]

There is a famous line in the film "Chinatown," where Faye Dunaway is being slapped in the face by Jack Nicholson, and she cries out, "She is my daughter! She is my sister! My daughter! My sister!" "A Surrogate's Nightmare" has all of the drama contained within those lines.

The two sisters with the complex relationship are Shelly and Angela. The latter returns to her hometown and reconnects with Shelly after having been estranged from her family for years. Because Shelly is infertile, Angela agrees to carry the child of Shelly and her husband David. Angela is advised by her doctor that she must avoid stress. But all that follows a never-ending saga of stress.

The anxiety begins with the death of the domineering mother of Shelly and Angela, who was murdered while she was out for a jog. After the funeral, the lives of the sisters are complicated by Shelly's distracted husband, who is seeking a promotion and may be transferred to Shanghai.

But the biggest nuisance is Angela's old flame named Curt, who wants her back in his life. Curt was sent to prison on charges of rape and pedophilia. Were those charges legitimate, or was he falsely accused and sent to prison where he had to endure unspeakable acts?

There are two sides to Curt, including the pleasant and smiling Curt and the one who is prone to rage. Curt turns on a dime and begins choking a customer while out with Angela at the town's Italian restaurant, La Bussola. He also smashes an object in the library, and starts throwing dishes after Angela declines to have a meal with him at his home. Finally, Curt nearly commits homicide in driving David off the road and almost burns down the sisters' home by tampering with the wiring.

Angela is a best-selling author of books on folklore. But she admits that she has never written on the mythology of her home town. Her experiences in this film would easily provide enough material to fill a large tome that could be entitled, "My Daughter! My Sister!"

THE ENDING THOUGH!? :(

[ericaaliciabrown · 8/10 · 17 February 2023]

This movie for a tv thing was actually so good! I thought it was gonna be super cheesy at first but it had me on edge until the very end. The end plot when everything is revealed is super unexpected and leaves me to wonder what happened to this family!? I just want to know if anyone was as pissed off about that ending as I was!? I would have liked to have seen what happened with Kurt and Angela's relationship in the end, a birth scene where her daughter could have seen the baby and some acknowledgement of how their family grew after all of it! But instead the ending was so abrupt, told me barely anything and the movie I wanted so badly to end on a good note left me upset. Lol. Anyone else hate this ending the way I did!?