TV Movie of the Week

The Perfect Wife

Helen Coburn (Lesley-Anne Down, TV’s Sunset Beach) suspects her ex-husband, Dr. Robert Steward (Perry King), has started seeing another woman. Well, he and Helen are divorced, so she shouldn’t be so surprised, really. In a not-shocking twist of events it transpires that the new woman, Liza (Shannon Sturges, Passions), is harbouring a dark secret and is actually rather unhinged, for reasons that will of course be withheld until the not-shocking climax. You see, unbeknownst to our hapless doc, his new lady-love is the-sister-of-a-man-who-was-killed-in-a-car-crash-and-died-despite-efforts-of-a-surgeon. She vows revenge on the surgeon, obviously, and in a rather convoluted and baffling scheme, she attempts to make said surgeon fall in love with her and marry her. Then, and only then, will she kill him and bask in the glory of her revenge. Simple, really. Does it come as a surprise to find out the surgeon who couldn’t save her brother is Dr. Robert Steward? Well, does it?!

Director Don E FauntLeRoy obviously knows his made-for-TV thriller movie tropes, for he deploys every last one of them with shameless aplomb. There’s lots of soft focus swooning, breathless exposition and melodramatic acting in which various characters suspect Liza isn’t who she says she is and try to warn the love-struck doc, who is of course unbelieving. A stand-out scene comes when Liza attempts to run down the doc in her car. ‘Oh honey! I am so sorry. I was just so excited to see you!’

Tagline to die for: He married for love. She married for revenge.