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Friday, July 1, 2022

Love Triangle Nightmare 2022 * 1/2 Stars

LOVE BITES

Love Triangle Nightmare is directed by Roxanne Boisvert. Let me rephrase that. Love Triangle Nightmare is shoddily directed by Roxanne Boisvert. What we have here is a blueprinted Lifetime film with all the compulsory bells and whistles. And when I mean bells and whistles, I don't mean the attractive ones. 

Love Triangle Nightmare is not really about a love triangle. It's just not. I mean maybe in the first half hour. The title is misleading as it's more about a nutso doctor who must have a woman who is on the verge of divorce. One or two red herrings aside and a tawdry flashback, the doctor in question (Jake played by Jeff Teravainen) is pretty much the antagonist before "Triangle" hits its second act. He's also a real cheeseball, a borderline goof, and not nearly menacing enough. 

Hardly compelling and wrapped up rather quickly as if the studio gave helmer Boisvert time constraints, Love Triangle Nightmare revels in bad dialogue, soap opera-style acting, foreseen fluff, and plenty of stark coincidences (people seem to always run into each other hint, hint). Above all else, "Triangle" feels so small-scale even in the scope of the Lifetime Network. Oblivious to the viewer who knows better, it does just enough to get by (and obviously that's not enough). 

There have been thousands of Lifetime movies that have gone down the pike, thousands. After decades of this stuff you'd think the long-running grapevine would bring something more fresh and intricate than the patchwork that is Love Triangle Nightmare. Every scene and climatic moment seems cut ever so quickly as if to say, "we didn't have the budget or chutzpah to do something more, sorry". "Triangle" stars Teravainen (mentioned earlier), Glenda Braganza, and Tomas Chovanec. On screen they look totally befuddled as do we the audience. Obtuse "triangle". 

Written by Jesse Burleson

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