Lifetime Review: 'Vanished: Searching for My Sister'

While Jada Stallworth (Tatyana Ali) loves her twin sister Kayla Davis, she can't say she hasn't been aggravated by some of her behavior. From drugs to partying to disappearing for days, Jada has grown accustomed to helping Kayla out of trouble. But now, it would appear Kayla is on the road to a better life. Recently divorced and having bought a new home, Kayla assures Jada that her irresponsible days are behind her. After borrowing $2,000 from Jada to finalize her home purchase, Kayla leaves her daughter with her sister for the night, promising to be back in the morning to pick her up.

When morning comes and Kayla is nowhere to be found, Jada initially thinks it's her sister being flaky as usual. But when days pass with no word from Kayla, Jada is convinced something must've happened to her. After filing a police report, Jada begins her own investigation into what happened to Kayla. She even resorts to impersonating her sister to get information. Jada's independent sleuthing puts her in hot water with the detectives on her sister's case--and in the crosshairs of the shady people in Kayla's life. But nothing is going to stop this determined sister from bringing the truth to light.

While Jada's determination to find her missing sister is commendable, be prepared to get frustrated with how she goes about doing it. If the investigating detectives were your usual unhelpful Lifetime cops, it would make sense why Jada feels the need to continuously take matters into her own hands. But since Detectives Hill and Nichols are perfectly competent at their jobs, Jada's claim that they're not taking her sister's case seriously doesn't hold water. It also makes her look incredibly foolish to continue investigating on her own, even when it starts putting herself (and vicariously her family) in danger. While it is a bit funny how Jada seems to take on her sister's irresponsibility in Kayla's absence, the gag soon wears off and Jada's recklessness is never truly punished. And once you put Jada's irritating actions together with the underwhelming story and meandering pace, Vanished: Searching for My Sister has a trio of enemies ready to tear it to shreds.

Jada's saving grace is that she's played by Tatyana Ali, who keeps Jada's sympathetic qualities alive despite her airheaded decisions. Ali throws herself into the moments whenever Jada bemoans her sister's disappearance or gets frustrated with the police's lack of progress. She reminds the viewer that, with her parents dead, Kayla is the only family Jada has left. She allows you to understand why Jada acts the way she does, even if a lot of her actions remain incredibly dense. Ali is just as effective whenever Jada is pretending to be her wilder sister and in the brief time she's given to play Kayla herself. Even with her sketchy history and somewhat immature attitude, Ali sells Kayla as a flawed but loving mother genuinely trying to get her life back on track. It's too bad that Vanished strands Ali and her equally talented co-stars in such a dull and blandly written mystery. Much of the movie is a cycle of Jada investigating Kayla's disappearance and getting scolded by the detectives and her ex-husband for it. It gets old pretty quick and leads into a bloated ending and an unsatisfying answer to the question of what happened to Kayla.

WARNING: SPOILERS BELOW

While the stagnant pace is bad enough, Vanished's greatest problem is how it wastes the opportunity to tell a good mystery. Initially, there are plenty of suspects for who could be responsible for Kayla going missing. She owes money to a violent drug dealer, her boyfriend Gary (a fiery cameo from Bobby Campo) is a short-tempered addict, and her club friends are suspiciously unconcerned when they find out Kayla has vanished. A lot of intrigue is built around Kayla's club life, particularly a vaguely discussed birthday party she attended where it's implied something untoward might've happened. But rather than following through on any of these threads, they all get abandoned in favor of the cliché reveal that Kayla's seemingly amicable ex Warren is actually an abusive monster who killed her in a jealous rage. When Jada-disguised-as-Kayla confronted a drunk Warren at the start of the final act, I was thinking she might actually be the real Kayla and that her sudden return would lead to some sort of shocking plot twist. But no, it's just Jada once again nearly getting herself killed.

After that, we're subsequently treated to an overly extended wrap-up where Warren (after initially succeeding in not attracting too much suspicion) seems to go out of his way to ensure he gets caught. After threatening Jada with a knife, he responds to the abuse allegations against him by smugly saying there are no police/hospital reports, tries to strangle Jada to death, and then tries to murder Jada a third time by arranging a hit against her in prison when he has no reason to trust a word his "assassin" says. It's ironic that Warren references Law & Order during his interrogation. The last act of Vanished resembles the denouement of a particularly boring episode of that series. The only good part of this messy conclusion is Justin Bruening's performance. He makes Warren ruggedly likable before his reveal, even sharing some good chemistry with Ali when it appears he and Jada are both scared and worried about Kayla. After his secret's out, Bruening digs into Warren's cold-blooded arrogance and psychotic fervor, making the most of his cookie-cutter "Evil Ex-Husband" role.

(One last thing: after that whole boring filler sequence of crimes, Vanished wraps up on an oddly chipper scene between Jada, Jada's daughter Meagan, and Kayla's daughter Olivia. It seems weird to end on such an upbeat scene after all that's happened. Kayla was viciously murdered and Olivia will have to grow up without her mother and with the knowledge that her father is a deranged murderer.)

Spoilers Over

Most of the supporting players don't make much impression, from Kayla's associates (a collection of generically unsavory criminal types) to her and Jada's daughters, who are kept to the sidelines for almost the whole movie. Phillip Mullings Jr. is memorable as Jada's ex-husband Terrell, as Terrell acts as the stable-headed alternative to Jada as she becomes more frazzled and impulsive the longer she's left without answers about Kayla. But even with him joining the detectives in warning his ex-wife to stand down, he still ends up helping her with one of her more audacious schemes. Speaking of the detectives, Jasmine Guy and Carolyn Hennesy make the best impression of the supporting cast as Detectives Hill and Nichols. The two do a great job of establishing their characters' Good Cop, Bad Cop dynamic. While both chide Jada for interfering with their work, Hill is more empathetic to her plight thanks to her backstory (which also gives Vanished a nice splash of casual representation) while Nichols is more likely to give Jada some well-earned sass for her Nancy Drew antics.

At the same time, both Hill and Nichols are shown to be dedicated detectives working hard to find the answers Jada needs. Guy and Hennesy make it easy to root for them, though their likability comes at the cost of making Jada look bad for unfairly accusing them of negligence. Jada/Kayla may be played by a capable actress and Tatyana Ali may be joined by a few similarly skilled co-stars. But Jada's aggravating and frankly idiotic detective work combine with the poorly paced story and horrifically botched mystery to create a taxing movie experience. If you're a fan of Ali or any of the other actors starring in Vanished, you might be interested in checking it out just for them. If you do, though, have some coffee or Mountain Dew on standby; you might need the caffeine to make it through to the end credits.

Score: 4 out of 10 yellow wigs.