Kirstie Alley, you are one cold-hearted
bitch.
So our dear sweet Kirstie plays Brenda
Gleck, a woman who opens her home to foster kids out of the goodness
of her heart. When the movie opens, Brenda is celebrating Mother's
Day with a shit ton of kids. Everyone looks super happy and glad to
be there, except for the one girl in the corner who just sits
quietly, holding her child. After opening dozens of expensive gifts,
daddy Alley asks the girl what she got for momma and proceeds to flip
out because it's the most important day of the year!
Kirstie calms him down and says it doesn't really matter.
Later
in the movie, the sad chick is revealed as Marie, a foster child. She
escapes with her son and tries to get some help. She keeps telling
them that Brenda and her husband did horrible stuff to her, but no
one will listen. They keep pointing out that the local
newspaper
did a story on what a great mother Brenda is so it must all be in her
mind.
A
few flashbacks reveal that Brenda is even crazier than previously
thought. She and her husband own a bunch of rental properties and
when people won't listen, she just sets their homes on fire and
collects the insurance money. One particularly bad situation comes
about when one of her tenants complains about roaches. Brenda can't
be bothered to fix it, so the woman calls the health department.
Three days later, her house goes up in flames. Brenda conveniently
shows up, yelling about her white trash tenant ruining her precious
home.
Oh,
and did I forget to mention that she teachers her kids how to
shoplift? Marie remembers getting caught outside a store and Brenda
slapping her in front of the manager to make herself look better.
When we see her taking back her Mother's Day gifts without any
receipts, we quickly discover that her kids just keep stealing.
Brenda
is not a big fan of landlord-tenant law either. When people can't pay
or whatever, she just tosses them out and steals their stuff. They
literally have a basement full of stuff belonging to people who
rented from them before. She's pretty defensive of her “real”
kids too. When her son-in-law decides that he can't handle this
whackadoo family anymore, he takes off and files for full custody of
his kids. Brenda gets her son to kidnap him, lock him in the
basement, and beat the shit out of him until he agrees to be a good
son-in-law again.
Then
we have poor Nadine. Nadine was a friend of Brenda's who completely
lost her shit when her boyfriend/husband took off and left her with a
baby. Brenda lets her move into their home and help out around the
house to pay her way. Help out around the house is code for “do
what I say or we will rape you and beat you.” Nadine is also
Marie's mom. One day when they leave her working outside, she runs
away. A cop finds her, calls Brenda, and they run to get her. Once
she goes back, they lock her in the basement again and beat her with
an extension cord. Can I just say that seeing Kirstie Alley berate
someone for folding towels wrong is the kind of thing that gives me
nightmares?
Marie
tries explaining to her mother what's going on, but her mom is super
confused. Even after Brenda goes to jail, Nadine keeps asking about
her. She also talks about how loving the family was and how one boy
promised to take care of her daughter, even
as he was raping her.
Marie
goes to a DA, but he doesn't move fast enough for her so she goes to
the press. They interview the Glecks and Brenda helpfully brings out
the newspaper clipping about what a great foster mother she is. Marie
then flashes back to the moment when she learned she was pregnant.
Brenda kept calling her fat, and she started beating the crap out of
her when Marie said she was pregnant. Her son jumped in the middle,
and I'm pretty sure that Brenda's husband knocked her up. Another
site said it was the son, but Brenda asks her husband if it's true
and he kind of shrugs and goes back to eating his cereal, so I am
pegging him as the baby daddy.
The
DA finally gets off his ass and they raid the house, finding Nadine
and a bunch of stolen merchandise in the basement. The “bad”
son-in-law tells him what he knows and they lock up a bunch of the
family members. That doesn't stop Brenda though because she calls one
of her guys and gives him a coded message to either threaten or kill
Marie. No worries though because she totally gets prison time and so
do her sons and husband.
