The Baby Snatcher – Review

The Baby Snatcher, aka Baby Dust, aka My Best Friend the Baby Snatcher, aka Maternal Sin is a Lifetime thriller directed by Andrew Lawrence (Frankie Meets Jack, Recess).

The story revolves around two best friends, Penelope (Adrienne Thomas – A Deadly Deed) and Eve (Jennifer Taylor – Shameless, Two and a Half Men) who find themselves pregnant at the same time. However, their special bond is shattered when Eve suffers a tragic miscarriage and she becomes deeply jealous, eventually unravelling mentally, leading her to extreme, violent and cold-blooded behaviour.

While Penelope and her husband Richie (Matthew Lawrence – Mrs. Doubtfire) embrace the joys of pregnancy, Eve descends into madness, going from being a loving wife and friend into a dangerous and erratic character, committing heinous vengeful acts.

The film explores themes of jealousy, loss, and mental instability, blending psychological tension with elements of horror.

While the film has drama and suspense, the plot, chemistry, character development, pacing and script are all over the place.

The main storyline is unrealistic with no real explanation as to why these two are “best friends” and Eve’s sudden switch isn’t particularly well handled. Andrew Lawrence hasn’t done a bad job building some tension and an eerie mood at times, but the script lets everyone down with parts of it feeling like they should be set in the middle of the night, not on a bright sunshine filled lazy afternoon. Why’s Richie so concerned about someone calling round in the afternoon when nobody has any reason to be concerned? Even by made for TV, afternoon movie standards the dialogue is painful in parts and it’s often like these characters have never met, let alone been married for years.

Eve going from being a fairly normal seeming individual into full blown Poison Ivy is bizarre. It’s a shame because there’s some solid acting in parts and if handled differently with some more character development, this change would have been more shocking and meaningful.

The film manages to create some unsettling moments and there is at least one genuine jump scare which shows there was some promise here, but unfortunately other decisions were confusing. A police man pulling Richie over and just letting him go after a random phone call. The detective going to the house alone and seemingly unarmed to face a suspected serial killer. A cot used as a hostage holding device. To me, the whole thing feels like it got mixed up in the edit. I’d probably describe the overall tone of this film as, inconsistent.

Overall, The Baby Snatcher is a film stunted by unconvincing character arcs, a lack of realism and a script that doesn’t feel like any of the three writers had faith in it. Despite decent performances from the cast, the muddled plot and jarring transitions in tone left me colder than this little girl’s Rocky Road!

Fans of this style of “Lifetime Movie” will love this and others will find it very watchable, it’s one of those afternoon films you watch and at the end utter the words “it wasn’t that bad” and who knows, it could become a cult classic for those very reasons.

You can check it out for yourself when The Baby Snatcher is released, 9th September 2024 from Scatena & Rosner Films.