It's very rare that one sees a made-for-TV movie with any real edge to it, which makes this hard-hitting effort all the more startling. It's a truly shocking, upsetting and disturbing film which openly deals with an emotionally charged, morbidly compelling and undeniably unpleasant topic (in this case pedophilia and child pornography) in a surprisingly frank, unflinching, nonexploitative manner and hence delivers an unexpectedly sinewy punch.
Richard Masur, astutely cast against type (he often appears in countless movies as your dad's affably goofy best bear-drinking buddy), delivers a frightfully creepy and utterly believable performance as Howie Nichols, a seemingly nice and harmless fellow who coaches an all-girls softball team. Beneath his warm, cuddly, ostensibly placid veneer, Howie is a deeply sick and loathsome man, a smoothly ingratiating child molester who recruits vulnerable teenage boys and girls for an underground small town kiddie porn racket. Howie's latest potential conquest is confused, bitter 13-year-old Jennifer Phillips (an achingly fragile and susceptible Dana Hill in a remarkably gutsy, on-target characterization), whose messed-up home life -- Jennifer's hard-working widow mother (beautifully played by Melinda Dillon) has acquired a new boyfriend (the always excellent Ronny Cox) Jennifer doesn't like -- makes her an easy target for Howie's smarmy, pseudo-sensitive and mock-understanding affection.
The sordid subject matter skirts cheap, tawdry exploitation at its most base and reprehensible, but thankfully the film itself steers clear of crass titillation and remains firmly grounded in revealing, confrontational, genuinely provocative domestic drama due to Robert Lewis' tasteful, restrained direction, Lew Hunter's thoughtful, trenchant, grimly engrossing script, and uniformly superlative acting. Masur in particular has never been better, bringing an oily, skin-crawling conviction and, most striking of all, even a fair degree of touching pathos to his fascinatingly grotesque part: Howie's the pathetic, socially maladaptive result of severe parental abuse and neglect who honestly thinks there's nothing wrong with his unsavory carnal interest in adolescents. For once television's strict censorship code against explicitness helps instead of hurts a film, saving this movie from becoming gross, unwatchable filth. Still, "Fallen Angel" is just graphic enough to make one feel uncomfortable and thus comes recommended with reservations. All in all, it's understandable that when this potently unsettling film first aired it was a huge ratings hit and subsequently won an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Special Drama: It's an extremely powerful and gut-wrenching examination of the warped psyche and unbalanced sexuality of a predatory, unrepentant pedophile.
Richard Masur, astutely cast against type (he often appears in countless movies as your dad's affably goofy best bear-drinking buddy), delivers a frightfully creepy and utterly believable performance as Howie Nichols, a seemingly nice and harmless fellow who coaches an all-girls softball team. Beneath his warm, cuddly, ostensibly placid veneer, Howie is a deeply sick and loathsome man, a smoothly ingratiating child molester who recruits vulnerable teenage boys and girls for an underground small town kiddie porn racket. Howie's latest potential conquest is confused, bitter 13-year-old Jennifer Phillips (an achingly fragile and susceptible Dana Hill in a remarkably gutsy, on-target characterization), whose messed-up home life -- Jennifer's hard-working widow mother (beautifully played by Melinda Dillon) has acquired a new boyfriend (the always excellent Ronny Cox) Jennifer doesn't like -- makes her an easy target for Howie's smarmy, pseudo-sensitive and mock-understanding affection.
The sordid subject matter skirts cheap, tawdry exploitation at its most base and reprehensible, but thankfully the film itself steers clear of crass titillation and remains firmly grounded in revealing, confrontational, genuinely provocative domestic drama due to Robert Lewis' tasteful, restrained direction, Lew Hunter's thoughtful, trenchant, grimly engrossing script, and uniformly superlative acting. Masur in particular has never been better, bringing an oily, skin-crawling conviction and, most striking of all, even a fair degree of touching pathos to his fascinatingly grotesque part: Howie's the pathetic, socially maladaptive result of severe parental abuse and neglect who honestly thinks there's nothing wrong with his unsavory carnal interest in adolescents. For once television's strict censorship code against explicitness helps instead of hurts a film, saving this movie from becoming gross, unwatchable filth. Still, "Fallen Angel" is just graphic enough to make one feel uncomfortable and thus comes recommended with reservations. All in all, it's understandable that when this potently unsettling film first aired it was a huge ratings hit and subsequently won an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Special Drama: It's an extremely powerful and gut-wrenching examination of the warped psyche and unbalanced sexuality of a predatory, unrepentant pedophile.