'Deadly Excursion: Kidnapped from the Beach' Review: Armstrong, DeBerry shine in Lifetime's thrill-packed feature film
Lifetime is set to take the viewers on a thrilling ride with its latest offering ‘Deadly Excursion: Kidnapped from the Beach’ featuring Samaire Armstrong and Ellie McCarthy reprising the roles of Samantha and Ellie. The movie is a sequel to the 2019 movie ‘Deadly Excursion’ and takes the story forward with a compelling storyline.
The movie starts with Ellie McCarthy (Alexandria DeBerry) telling her mom Samantha McCarthy (Samaire Armstrong) that she has won the beach volleyball tournament and has been called to play an international tournament in Florida. However, Samantha and her husband David (Corin Nemec) are not that keen to let Ellie leave for Florida because of what happened in the first movie.
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If you haven’t seen the first movie, then you should know that Samantha and Ellie charter a sailboat while on spring break only to discover the captain has plans to make sure they never return home. However, they manage to get out of his captivity after facing a lot of dangerous situations.
Now, coming back to the second movie, Ellie’s parents decide to accompany her to Florida. The entire family takes a trip to Florida and plans to enjoy the moment. However, Ellie still hasn’t been able to cope with everything that happened in the past. She manages to win the beach volleyball tournament and they celebrate the win by going out for a dinner.
Meanwhile, the McCarthys are intercepted by the swarthy César Rodriguez (Matt Cedeno) and son Miguel (David Meza) who kidnaps Samantha, David, and Ellie in an attempt to extort the missing $200,000 bridal delivery payment they accuse Samantha of funneling into her new Texas restaurant. On the other hand, fugitive Ian LeBlanc, younger brother of the boat captain who previously abducted her, surfaces, dead-set on tracking down Ellie.
But, there’s a catch. Miguel doesn’t have a good relationship with his father and has set his eyes on Ellie.
The movie is far from perfect, but it still has so much for the fans. First things first, the movie works because of the actors. Samaire’s portrayal of Samantha is really amazing and the way she tries to save her family at the hand of the villain is menacing. Her portrayal of a mother who outpaces the villain to take her family out of this dangerous situation is a treat to watch. Armstrong is strong throughout Samantha’s arc of character growth and shares emotional scenes with both DeBerry and Nemec.
Meanwhile, DeBerry as Ellie has once again shown us that she is indeed a bright talent and can do wonders if she is given a chance to play the lead role in a major motion picture. The actress is naturally sympathetic and sells Ellie's emotional devastation throughout the movie with authenticity.
The antagonists, played by Cedeno and Meza, are actually the scene stealers. Cedeno is convincing as a man who wants to have revenge for losing his money and will do anything to get his money back. On the other hand, Meza as Miguel is torn between making his father proud and doing what he actually wants to.
In the first film, Jonathan Bouvier did a fantastic job as the side antagonist and returns to the movie to help the McCarthy’s. The sequel introduces him as someone who never had happiness in his life and now, wants to do the right thing by being on the right side. Bouvier is exceptional as Ian and manages to make the viewers emotional with his acting.
‘Deadly Excursion: Kidnapped from the Beach’ is not the best movie in the genre and is far from being a perfect thriller. But in the end, it does what all Lifetime movies should set out to do: entertain. The movie is packed with thrills and some unexpected twists and turns. When you mix all that with a strong cast, you get a movie that manages to satisfy the ardent fans of the network.
The movie, ‘Deadly Excursion: Kidnapped from the Beach’, will exclusively premiere on Friday, March 19, at 8 pm ET.