Lifetime Review: 'Baby Monitor Murders'

This summer, things aren't exactly going according to plan for college student and aspiring musician Cassie Temple (Natalie Sharp). With her Los Angeles music internship canceled, she'll have to settle for going home to her Washington hometown of Apple Springs for the break. It's after a chance encounter with Chloe Paine (Nicole LaPlaca) that Cassie lands herself a job babysitting for her six-year-old daughter Becca (Emma Oliver). At first, the gig couldn't be better, with Cassie quickly bonding with Becca and becoming friendly with Chloe and her husband Tom (Jon Cor).

But when Chloe suddenly vanishes without a trace, Cassie suddenly finds herself entrenched in an alarming police investigation. With the town already on edge after the disappearance of local woman Mallory Raymond (Cassandra Ebner), Cassie begins to wonder what's going on in her sleepy little hometown--and if Tom is as trustworthy as she initially thought.

With Lifetime having recently premiered two nanny/babysitter-based thrillers, I thought it would only be fitting to go back to last year and cover a "Nanny in Peril" drama that I didn't get to see when it first premiered. On paper, Baby Monitor Murders would appear to be little different from the previous two nanny dramas I've reviewed: a woman gets a job babysitting for a couple, only to learn the hard way that the father has a few screws loose. But while Tom Paine no doubt has issues, Baby Monitor Murders turns out to be a well-structured murder mystery, with enough twists and turns and to have you wondering if the obvious suspect is the right one. Between that and the strong cast, Baby Monitor Murders keeps you invested as it takes its time to unfold its mystery.

Slower-paced Lifetime movies have often been hit-or-miss, but with Baby Monitor Murders, the pace rarely feels needlessly dragged out. Moments when you'll find your focus wandering are few and far between, with the deliberate pace effectively building intrigue around what happened to Mallory and Chloe. The suspect pool is a tiny one, and by the third act, you'll be certain to have pinpointed the guilty party (especially if you're a regular Lifetime viewer). But along the way, it makes for a nice guessing game as you try to deduce which of the suspects is the culprit and what their endgame is. Plus, unlike some of Lifetime's other mysteries, the answer isn't so obvious--either in-universe or out--that Cassie looks like an idiot for not figuring it out sooner.

Speaking of, Cassie Temple is a breath of fresh air after The Nanny Murders presented us with the problematic Jamie Kassman. As played by Natalie Sharp in her first leading Lifetime role, Cassie is an effortlessly sweet and caring girl, bringing credibility to her established babysitting history. Sharp and Emma Oliver click together perfectly as a warm friendship quickly forms between Cassie and Becca. Combined, these make for essential ingredients to the plot, as it's made believable that Cassie would care enough about Becca to stay on as her sitter, even as things in the Paine household grow more and more unstable. Cassie is consistently likable and sympathetic throughout the film, with Sharp giving an equally consistent performance that's at its best when the final act has Cassie at her most emotional.

Tom Paine and Glenn Raymond both make for well-written suspects, with Jon Cor and Dustin Lloyd both playing well off of Sharp. Cor brings as much emotive prowess to Tom as Sharp gives to Cassie, making you feel for the struggling father even as he begins to look suspicious. Lloyd does the same as the more volatile Glenn, with both men selling their characters' apparent frustrations with how the local law is handling their wives' disappearances. And like Cor, Lloyd will have you alternating between feeling sorry for Glenn and suspecting there's something darker lurking behind his short temper and outrage against the police. SPOILER ALERT While the ultimate motivation behind Mallory and Chloe's kidnappings is standard Self-Entitled Psycho fare, Brendan Taylor still gives a strong performance as obsessed therapist Jim Gideon. He makes Jim innocuous enough pre-reveal to where you understand why Cassie trusts him, and post-reveal, Taylor dives into Jim's deluded ramblings about his female patients and how he "deserves" to have Tim's family for himself. It makes seeing Cassie show off her inner badass and escape Jim's clutches all the more epic.

(The climax also makes way for a satisfyingly sweet ending. The bond that's formed between Cassie and the Paine family is touchingly authentic, as is Tom's now fully realized character. After spending much of the movie as an enigma, Tom is revealed to be a genuinely loving husband and father who wants to make up for his past indiscretions. It's a heartfelt development that Cor plays for all the proper emotion) Spoilers Over

While Sheriff Hayes initially seems like the standard useless Lifetime movie cop, Blake Stadel plays him with a sense of likability and the story makes it logical that he would be suspicious of Glenn and later Tom. Raylene Harewood makes for a compelling Genre Savvy side character as Cassie's friend Lucy and Latonya Williams makes a decent little impact as Sheriff Hayes' supportive deputy Laura Bergen. Nicole LaPlaca finishes off the supporting cast as the ill-fated Chloe Paine, and despite her very limited screentime and a few stiff deliveries, LaPlaca makes Nicole a sweet-natured wife and mother you'll cringe to see inevitably fall victim to the film's sinister antagonist.

With a better written and paced story and a more likable main heroine, Baby Monitor Murders turns out to be quite a bit better than its similarly titled successor. The story's controlled build-up might not be to everyone's liking and the truth behind the central mystery is far from groundbreaking for the Lifetimeverse. But with the way it's presented through compelling characters and a well-constructed atmosphere of intrigue and suspense, Baby Monitor Murders is one of Lifetime's better whodunnit thrillers. And after her fantastic performance here, I'd love to see Natalie Sharp return to Lifetime as a new recurring star.

Score: 8.5 out of 10 playdates with Lily.