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Lifetime Review: 'Secrets in the Basement'

Melina Bartzokis makes an astonishing Lifetime debut as a troubled woman with a killer new house.

By Trevor WellsPublished 4 years ago 5 min read
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As soon as she set eyes on her new home, Delilah Brenner (Melina Bartzokis) was amazed that her realtor friend Barbara (Valentina Izarra) was able to find such a perfect house. After a traumatic incident in the city, all Delilah and her husband Shawn (Nick Cassidy) want is a fresh start. But it's not long after Delilah begins settling into her new digs that she begins to suspect her demons have come back to haunt her.

In addition to lingering damage from what happened in the city, odd things happening around the house push Delilah to her limit. Her only comfort comes in the support she has from Shawn and Barbara, as well as her new friend Jay Cristo (Micah McNeil)--her house's charismatic designer. Little does Delilah know that her idyllic new home comes with a hidden danger: a prowler lurking in the secret basement, with a diabolical plot against Delilah in the works. This dream house is about to become a living nightmare--one that Delilah might not survive.

A tip for those who haven't seen Secrets in the Basement yet: do not go into it expecting a whodunnit mystery. Lifetime's marketing department seemed to realize that themselves, given how their promo for the movie flat-out reveals who the culprit is. But unlike other Lifetime movies with similarly spoiler-ific marketing, Secrets in the Basement doesn't wait until the last act to make its reveal. As such, the easy-to-piece-together mystery avoids coming across as an insult to the viewer's intelligence, and instead contributes to Secrets in the Basement's suspense-driven nature.

Suspense ultimately becomes the film's biggest selling point, with the cast working with the well-paced script to cultivate the feeling of dread that permeates Secrets in the Basement. In her first-ever Lifetime role, Melina Bartzokis is phenomenal as the troubled Delilah Brenner. While her introductory scene of eagerly gushing over every detail of her new home might grate some nerves, Bartzokis recovers by quickly establishing Delilah as a woman struggling to cope with mental health issues. Bartzokis allows the anxiety and depression that grips Delilah to become subtly visible through her expressions and tone. This in turn helps give weight to Delilah's more emotional moments, with Bartzokis delivering such scenes with painstaking realism. Anyone who's ever struggled with mental health is sure to relate to Delilah, and that makes it all the easier to sympathize with her as she's further terrorized and gaslit by her live-in stalker.

WARNING: (sorta) Spoilers Below

Joining Bartzokis in top-notch performances is Micah McNeil as charismatic designer Jay Cristo. Much like how Bartzokis throws herself into Delilah's instability, McNeil excels at bringing both sides of Jay to life. When we first meet Jay, he's an exuberant and affable man who strikes up a quick friendship with Delilah over their shared love for home design. McNeil effortlessly gives Jay's charisma an intoxicating quality, making it believable that the vulnerable Delilah would trust him so easily. On an aesthetic note, whoever was in charge of McNeil's wardrobe for the film did an excellent job at crafting a style to match Jay's loud and attention-grabbing personality without going overboard.

When it comes to Jay's darker side as Delilah's vengeful tormentor, McNeil has a handful of fumbles when he lays on the evil a little thick. Jay's first interaction with Delilah when he gives her some forceful decorating advice is the biggest example of this. But for the most part, McNeil continues his stellar performance as he gives a fire to Jay's hellbent desire for revenge. He might even have you feeling a speck of empathy for Jay when his heartache for his wife's condition and his not-entirely-unjustified anger against Delilah takes the spotlight.

(Though in regards to Jay's backstory, a plot hole cropped up that I couldn't let go of. If Delilah and Shawn's new house was Jay and Betty's, why was she living in the apartment that Delilah designed? The carving Delilah uncovers seemed to suggest they were living together before her hospitalization)

Spoilers Over

Nick Cassidy and Valentina Izarra make up the last of the main cast, with both bringing warm likability to their lesser-explored characters. Izarra brings an authentic air of compassion to Barbara as she becomes a shoulder of support for Delilah (she and Bartzokis share strong chemistry during a scene where Delilah opens up about her past). And apart from one scene where he acts uncharacteristically brusque about his wife's mental health issues, Shawn is just as supportive of Delilah as Barbara and Cassidy forms the same chemistry with Bartzokis.

Plot-wise, Secrets in the Basement starts off a bit slow, but makes up for it once the movie dives headfirst into Delilah's mental decline and the machinations of her stalker. It all leads up to an intense climax, even if it requires a bit of disbelief suspension to fathom some of the events that make it possible. Hernan Herrera also deserves a shout-out for Secrets in the Basement's cinematography. Delilah's dream sequences and climactic breakdown is shot in an effectively disorienting and unnerving manner to put us in Delilah's frame of mind.

When it comes to the movie's atypical ending, it's a mixed bag. On the positive side, it goes against the usual Lifetime formula and works well with the film's tone. After how authentically it portrayed Delilah's mental health struggles, ending Secrets in the Basement on the average "Flash Forward to Happy Ending" scene would've been insulting. But on the other hand, it still comes across as an abrupt and somewhat unsatisfying conclusion--especially with no confirmation of a sequel in sight.

For his first Lifetime thriller, writer Guy Yosub makes his mark with a script that provides everything a great Lifetime feature needs. Intense yet entertaining, Secrets in the Basement is brought to life by an amazing lead actress and the team of performers that surrounds her. While a few hiccups pop up, Yosub's script and the cast's talents make them easier to forgive. Let's hope this is the beginning of Yosub's journey to becoming a Lifetime regular--with the second step being Secrets in the Basement 2.

Score: 8.5 out of 10 hammer tattoos.

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About the Creator

Trevor Wells

Aspiring writer and film lover: Lifetime, Hallmark, indie, and anything else that strikes my interest. He/him.

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Twitter: @TrevorWells98

Instagram: @trevorwells_16

Email: [email protected]

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