When Laurie Harriman’s father kills her mother, brother, and himself after being accused of embezzling money from a large corporation, she vows revenge on the man she feels is responsible: Bob Martin, the owner of the corporation. Conveniently, she’s a registered nurse and Bob’s just had a stroke that’s put him into a paralyzed, but fully conscious, state.
Lisa Zane stars as the nurse in question. She takes on another identity and sets herself up as the perfect person to care for Bob Martin (Michael Fairman) in his home, while she plans to off him and his whole family. She does so by injecting the current nurse with a chemical to induce a heart attack. Then, by properly positioning herself at the right places at the right times, she wins the job as the live-in nurse. Of course, she also schemes to take advantage of each of the family’s individual weaknesses to make the death of every inhabitant of the household a complete coincidence.
With a setup like this, one probably should expect that this film will deliver B-grade shocks and even lower quality acting and it doesn’t disappoint. It probably would have been a lot more effective with a lower camp quotient, but it would have been a little bit less enjoyable had it taken itself seriously. The unintentional humor is what kept me from turning it off.
If I had a dollar for each of the shots of Bob Martin’s expressionless face, I could give up my day job and retire. The range of emotion the actor displays as the wheelchair bound executive is simply breathtaking. For example, rapid and/or heavy breathing convey terror. Blank stares are indicative of virtually everything else. However, it does manage to be pretty much all one could expect from a direct-to-video movie about a revenge-crazed live-in nurse caring for a paralyzed man.
I won’t go into all the reasons the movie could have been over in 15 minutes. That would ruin the campy fun of this moronic movie. If you don’t appreciate camp, knock a star off of the rating. This movie was clearly made to be featured on Mystery Science Theater 3000.
1.5 out of 5.0 stars
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