User Reviews

The kid is one of the biggest idiots since Opie and Barney of The Andy Griffith Show! A Complete Moron!!!!!!!!! How could he steal that money and put his mother's life in jeopardy? What this kid did is the stupidest single act in cinema history! But, the biggest overall idiot is the redhead in the first episode of Columbo (the pilot..Prescription Murder). A real moron!

Spoilers ahead. Suburban single mom and her teenage son get entangled with a seductive mob hit woman, who is trying to run off with the mob boss's money. Features your usual assortment of corrupt cops and mob tough guys chasing our heroes and trying to get the money back. Sure, a routine plot, but this one is better than average, mostly because of superior acting. Erika Eleniak is totally adorable and convincing as the mother. She is no longer a sexy young thing, but it looks like middle age is really going to agree with her. Best acting honors though go to Jeremy Lelliot, who convincingly plays her son, and carries the film. This character is the hinge for most of the story's development, and a lesser actor in the role would have destroyed the movie.

Oh, and of course there is as always one of those Baldwin guys in some role or other. The Baldwins ought to get their own union -- but they probably don't need it, as it already seems to be a rule in Hollywood that you need at least one Baldwin in every movie. Feh!

Anyway, the dialogue and action really move this film along. Pleasant and diverting, good for an evening's entertainment.

Yes, Betrayal is a B-thriller. Though, the opening sequences hint a sort of 80s made-for-TV movie quality, which this movie might've done better as. That, or, if the writing had been strong enough, a psychopath exploitation movie of the 60s and 70s. Instead, Betrayal is poorly written, and at times, poorly acted.

Here, the stories of two groups of people collide. On the one hand is the seductive Jayne, a ruthless hit-woman who settles a contract for a mob boss, but then decides to run off with money meet her partner somewhere in Texas. She's quick with a gun and has a "nuclear weapon between her legs," so the henchmen have no easy task ahead of them trying to get to her. On the other hand, you have a seemingly quaint mother and teen son who are heavily in debt. So, the bonehead son (and this is not his first of flubs), having connections to street thugs, decides to help his mother by delivering some cocaine for a gangster. Only, he is jumped and the stash is stolen. And the gangster thinks that the son tried to rip him off (though, other than a drive-by shooting, he doesn't seem convinced enough to stick around looking for him). So his mother decides that now, they have to flee to Texas to stay with her mother. So of course, they cross paths with Jayne who concocts a story so she can hitch a ride with them. And now they have mafia, crooked cops, and the FBI on their tail... the chase is on.

Only, despite the forced meeting of the characters, the movie might've been more enjoyable B-movie fare if the events transpired in a more believable way. Given, the scenes between the mother and son at the train station, you'd think it was just another day they were going to visit grandma rather than the necessity to flee from a gangster looking for his stash of cocaine. There are also several opportunities for them to escape from Jayne just as there are opportunities for the hit men to kill Jayne. As the movie progresses, things proceed almost haphazardly as though it were a light dress rehearsal. In absence of the budget for greater action sequences like chase scenes and the like, the writing should have at least been much stronger.

Mark Lester is one of the few drive-in era directors still putting out movies. This one - where Erika Eleniak is on the run from drug dealers and comes into the orbit of a hitwoman (Julie du Page) - is one of the many films he's quietly released to cable and streaming in the past few years.

Also known as Lady Jayne: Killer, this movie also features Adam Baldwin and James Remar, who is always welcome to be in any movie. As always, the simple idea - killer accidentally takes briefcase with mob money, gets a price on her head and kidnaps a family to escape - is much better in the execution thanks to Lester.

Betrayal is a B movie all right, but it has a plot with interesting angles and delivers good entertainment, some suspense and many hilarious moments. The main character is a teenager with a low IQ but a high sense of responsibility – in short an Anti James Dean. His mother, a single mom, is totally broke and he wants to help them get out of their misery. So he takes on a job: delivering bags he does not know what's in them. Even the first delivery goes wrong because the boy wants to help a guy who is writhing and retching on the ground. It's a trap and the boy sees the bag snatched away from him because he showed empathy.

He goes back to mom, after a while the gangsters shoot into the house and the boy tells his mom everything and says that he is sorry. Mom says it's bad, but that she is even MORE sorry than he (this exchange seems to be inspired by Dr. Strangelove and is repeated several times throughout the movie). They decide to flee to granny who is living far away, but have not the money to buy a train ticket. Luck strikes as in the queue in front of the railroad ticket office they meet a sexy young lady who says she had her driver's license removed, wants to travel to the same destination and offers them to finance a rental car )which is terribly unreliable, as it will turn out). Big, big coincidences, but not entirely impossible or unbelievable.

The sexy lady is, of course, a contract killer who carries millions in cash in her aluminum suitcase and is pursued by the police and the mob she stole the money from. Mom and son are used as a shield, and the son gets some sexual education on the way. That this weird triangle works so well can be credited to the involved actors who do a good job. Especially Jeremy Lelliott is very convincing, he is quite likable and displays the necessary goofiness for the part.

A lot more happens in this movie, coincidences abound and the good people win in the end. My favorite scene is the son's coming home to the deserted house he and his mom supposedly have left for an undetermined but certainly pretty long time. He carries the aluminum suitcase with its precious content and is pursued by the mob, the corrupt police, the honest police and the sexy lady who is a killer. But he quietly goes to the fridge, takes out a ready to eat dinner and switches the TV on, where just that moment, just on that channel there is some news about the mob, the sexy lady killer, his mom and their exchange. Speak of an ideal situation. Life really should be that way, sometimes.

You single moms out there, take an example from this movie, do hide a revolver in the exhaust hood of your kitchen too – just in case. It might come in handy, as Betrayal amply proves. And the gun will remain well greased over any length of time.

Very obvious, in-your-face film. Not very believable, but totally fun. Julie du Page is gorgeous; so fit and strong! I'm glad that all the lead being spewed by the shotguns didn't touch her. Yeah, three men, all shooting shotguns didn't do anything. But, that's okay. She had to win. The teen boy was hilarious; such a dork! Everything he touched bit his hand. And when he tried to fight our villainess, she tossed him aside like he was a scarecrow. He even stayed down! Except for the body of our villainess, this looked like a made-for-TV movie. But still, goofy, sexy, fun. Seen on Tubi, the free streaming site, which now has live TV.

I found BETRAYAL to be a fun B-movie thriller from director Mark L. Lester, the man who made the superlative COMMANDO back in the day. He's working with a much smaller budget here but the film is much better than its IMDb rating would have you think. It's essentially a road movie in which a mother and son get into difficulty with some drug dealers and decide to head off for a while, only to end up taking along a hitwoman hitchhiker being pursued by the mob.

This film is on the cheesy side at times, but it's generally pretty well made and certainly fast-paced throughout. There's always some violent action in the form of shoot-outs going on to keep your mind occupied, and enough oddball characters to bring to mind movies such as TRUE ROMANCE. An ageing Erika Eleniak plays the protective mother while Julie du Page has a ball as the femme fatale. Elsewhere we get Louis Mandylor and Tom Wright reuniting after MARTIAL LAW alongside smaller parts for old-timers James Remar and Don Swayze. It's no masterpiece, but it did entertain me.