I thought this was a well done movie for a made for TV movie. I think the cast all did a good job.
James Wilder as the diabolical boyfriend/husband Scott gives me the creeps. Roxanne Hart as the heiress made me feel so sorry for her character. There are times when she talks and is crying and her voice quivers and it is so believable. How any woman puts up with such abuse is so hard to understand. The daughters were a good contrast to each other - Holly Marie Combs as the strong sister Alex and Sarah Chalke as the lush, weak sister prone to her mother's poor choice in men.
The way that man shamed and humiliated that woman was unbelievable. Its hard to believe her daughters couldn't have done more to intervene. Hopefully, domestic abuse laws in NY have changed to have more automatic, severe penalties for abusers. The thing that I don't get is that the movie states several times that court favors attempted reconciliation. Why in the world - in the 1990's- would the court encourage a woman to go back to her abuser. This wasn't the 1950's, when abuse was swept under the rug, and people turned a blind eye.
I think this movie reveals an important truth - that violence is an equal-opportunity evil; it inflicts the wealthy as well as the poor. People tend to think violence is an inner-city or working-class problem, but it doesn't discriminate. While they may not make up the majority, wealthy killers aren't hard to find in prison. In the graveyard, wealthy victims are even easier to find.