This Tempting Madness review

By Simon Thompson

Director/co-writer Jennifer E Montgomery’s This Tempting Madness is a psychological thriller with all the depth of a perfume advert. All the pretty cinematography in the world unfortunately can’t save this vapid, poorly executed mess which crumbles apart more easily than Neymar’s hamstrings. 

This Tempting Madness, follows Mia ( Simone Ashley) a young woman waking up from a serious coma. As she wakes up, Mia discovers that her husband Jake (Austin Stowell) is in jail on charged with her attempted murder, and struggling with massive memory gaps of her own, begins to piece together what happened before the accident. 

Jennifer E Montgomery and Andrew Davis’s script is laughably bad, none of the characters come across as real people, the narrative is frustratingly vague, culminating in a final plot twist in the last fifteen minutes which I could charitably describe as lacklustre. 

While the cinematography by Andrew Davis is pleasing to look at, all of the interior locations, which mainly consist of luxury accommodation, feel far too clean and uninhabited. When you look at a great thriller of any kind, for example Michael Mann’s Heat, the environments feel lived in and characterful, in This Tempting Madness on the other hand ever interior has the soul of a 3d model by an estate agent.

Simone Ashley as Mia does a seamless American accent but the rest of her performance is let down by the script. Austin Stowell as Jake plays  him about as subtly as if he were in a telenovela, and, given that this is a psychological thriller that is demanding you take it seriously, is wildly out of place with the tone that is trying to be established.

Overall I can’t recommend This Tempting Madness on the strength of its merits as a serious psychological thriller, or as a get pissed and have a laugh Mommie Dearest/The Room style experience either. The biggest sin of this movie is that it has all the staying power of a McDonalds’ happy meal, and that watching you find yourself bored far more than you ever do on the edge of your seat.