Villainess Review: Francine Campali (Murdered at 17)

In 2018, Lifetime gave us Murdered at 17, one of the many installments from their themed "At 17" films, and this film's central villain was Jake Campali, who is visited by his mother, Francine, as the film's opening scene. Jake is clearly not happy to see his mother, who visited Jake under the claim that his father, Mike, was dying from cancer and she needed money to help pay his medical bills. Jake basically celebrated the news, and the reason: Mike was very abusive to Jake during his childhood, and in addition, Francine turned a blind eye to her husband's abuse.

In addition, Jake was also angry that his parents didn't help him pay for college, though Francine responded with praise towards her son, claiming that she knew he didn't need college due to his app making millions. Their conversation ended with Jake ejecting Francine from his home, and we see Jake's psychotic nature play out in the entire film, as he begins a relationship with Brooke Emerson and uses manipulation and his own brand of abuse to control her, even resorting to killing Brooke's best friend, Maddie Finley, and framing her for the murder. Wow!

Of course, in true Lifetime film fashion, Jake gets his comeuppance and gets arrested. But where's Mommy Dearest? The final scenes showed Francine back at her son's home, and robbing it. For an added bonus, Francine is committing this robbery with the non-cancerous (only literally, figuratively is another story) Mike, with the villainess boasting about her phony story to Jake, and adding that Jake deserved to be robbed blind by his own parents. All the while, Jake was in prison getting his one phone call, and he made that call to Francine, but getting no answer.

Murdered at 17 aired on July 8, 2018, and part of its amazing cast included Allison Graham as villainess Francine Campali. Despite Graham's limited screen time, she definitely made an impression with me in this film, and here's why. In the beginning, we see Francine respond to her past callous actions with assumed remorse and praise for her son, leading us to believe that she had changed. However, Francine's heel turn during the film's final scenes showed that it was all an act, and also established that she was every bit as evil (if not more so) as her equally villainous husband was. And I cannot help but love Francine's heelish attire in the final scenes; it's a complete 180 from her introduction. I tend to notice things like this in wrestling; faces and heels differ in fashion style. As a (presumed) face, Francine has that caring and maternal look as she appeared to have redeemed herself. As a heel, Francine has a typical "bad girl/criminal" look that I just couldn't help but love, and Graham pulled it off very well.

Allison Graham is a veteran of Lifetime films, which include four of the "At 17" movies. She's done Dead, Fugitive, and Guilty, though Murdered serves as a rare villainous role for Graham. Regarding Francine, Graham acted out her alleged redemption from her past very well, but she really shined during Francine's heel turn in the final scenes, as we saw Graham portray Francine's arrogance and callous personality very well. This was an excellent villainous performance from Allison Graham, I truly hope we get more evil roles from her, especially in Lifetime films.

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