Cyber Seduction: His Secret Life is a 2005 American psychological drama television film about a teenage boy whose life goes downhill after he develops an addiction to internet pornography. The film was directed by Tom McLoughlin, and stars Jeremy Sumpter in the main role, with co-actors including Kelly Lynch, Jake Scott and Lyndsy Fonseca. It first aired on the Lifetime channel on June 25, 2005, and received no notable critical reviews initially, but in the 2010s became considered a stereotypical example of Lifetime original films after renewed attention to the title, and it received an unexpected cult following.
| Cyber Seduction: His Secret Life | |
|---|---|
 Film poster | |
| Genre | Psychological drama |
| Teleplay by |
|
| Story by | Wesley Bishop |
| Directed by | Tom McLoughlin |
| Starring |
|
| Music by | Louis Febre |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Original language | English |
| Production | |
| Executive producer | Howard Braunstein |
| Cinematography | Rudolf Blahacek |
| Editor | Charles Bornstein |
| Running time | 87 minutes |
| Production companies |
|
| Original release | |
| Network | Lifetime |
| Release | June 25, 2005 |
Plot
editJustin Petersen is a high school sophomore who gets a spot on the swim team and hopes that he'll get a scholarship. His mother, Diane, was also a competitive swimmer when she went to high school. Justin is a virgin, but he has a girlfriend, Amy, a devout Christian who wants Justin to wait for sex until marriage. However, another girl named Monica repeatedly flirts with Justin, but he ignores her.
While in his home, Justin receives a direct message from Timmy, a classmate of his, and sends him a link to Monica's website that has sexual images of her. Justin receives another direct message later in the day with a link to a pornographic website titled "big-breasted women." Justin stays up all night to look at it, consuming energy drinks to wake himself up. Diane catches him on the website and, in horror, asks her husband, Richard, to tell Justin about sex and female respect. The subject matter confuses Justin, who makes increased efforts to hide his downloaded porn.
Justin's addiction makes him fail his swim practices and becomes more obsessed with Monica. He watches porn on Amy's palm pilot when nobody's looking. Alex, Justin's little brother, sees Justin looking at porn and promises to keep it a secret. Alex later shows another classmate of his, Thomas, about what he saw. Justin shows Timmy a BDSM site, and to Justin's surprise, Timmy negatively responds to it. He also sees Diane in the swimming pool, and despite her being his mother, he fantasizes about her sexually.
Justin ends up in third place on a significant swim meet, disappointing his mother. His brother Alex emails himself sexual images and burns CDs of porn, and Diane finds his CD named "Virgin Vaginas" and is disturbed. Diane asks Justin about the CD, and he says that his classmates are sending images of porn to him as a joke, and Alex claims he found it by accident on his computer. Diane is in disbelief about the statement, while her husband's believes.
Justin messages Monica to meet up. He lies to his parent about going to Amy's house for homework. Justin's meetup with Monica is awkward and ends abruptly. The morning after, Justin's computer was moved to the family room by Diane after realizing that he wasn't at Amy's house.
Justin attempts to have sex with Amy, but she refuses, and Justin leaves angrily. Diane gets a call from the school, saying that Thomas, Alex's friend, was showing pornographic images on his laptop at school to others, and Alex was the one who sent it. Diane decided to cancel internet access in the home.
Amy shows her palm pilot's history to Justin during a swim meeting and gets furious at him. Justin tries to look at porn in the school's library but gets caught. The parents find out that his school grades are poor and that the swim team has suspended him. Justin's parents decide to ground him for the rest of the semester.
During that night, Justin has trouble sleeping and decides to use Diane's credit card and buy internet access and pornography that night. He decides to attempt to have sex with Monica the next day. Monica insists on having sex in a bed that appears to belong to her grandparents, with a photo of them on the adjacent wall. Terrified at the prospect of real sex, Justin flees, and Monica is emotionally upset. She hits her head violently against a bathroom sink.
Justin's parents find out about what happened last night and are disappointed. Justin realizes he must apologize to Amy, and Diane lets him. He apologizes and asks if they can get back together. Amy declines, and Justin says that he'll start going to church.
Justin walks home, and an individual sees them. The person tells Dooley (Monica's boyfriend), Timmy, and Monica. Dooley and Timmy abruptly exit, revealing that Monica lied about the cut she got on her forehead and that it was from Justin. Justin gets beaten up by Dooley, but Timmy tells him to stop before he beats him too much. When they drive away, Justin breaks into the high school at night and sneaks into the swimming pool, flopping in and attempting to drown himself. When he thinks back to his family, Amy, and the swim team, he decides to rise from the water and swim across the pool with a smile on his face.
Cast
edit- Jeremy Sumpter as Justin Petersen
- Kelly Lynch as Diane Petersen
- Jake Scott as Alex Petersen
- John Robinson as Steven Petersen
- Lyndsy Fonseca as Amy
- Nicole Dicker as Monica
- Kyle Schmid as Timmy
- Briony Glassco as Beth
- Benz Antoine as Coach Suha
Reception
edit
Cyber Seduction: His Secret Life received a cult following after its release, due to its poor quality and shoddy production. Yvette Del Rio of Movies of Our Lifetime rated the film 10/10 because she found it unintentionally comedic; she noted elements such as Justin's internet username being "Stroke Man" and called the film "one of those Lifetime Classics, up there with Mother May I Sleep With Danger?."[2] The A.V. Club added the film to its list of best introductory Lifetime movies to watch, stating, "this is the kind of movie designed to make worried moms search their sons’ web histories, and those sons giggle because seriously, who has a PDA anymore?".[1] USA Today added the film to a list of Lifetime movies beloved to "hate-watch", mockingly saying of it, "OF COURSE the best freestyle swimmer in the whole state has a porn addiction! And OF COURSE it leads him down a path of betrayal, violent attacks, depression and probation! What better, more realistic plot to a story is there?!"[3] Mustafa Gatollari of Distractify considered Cyber Seduction: His Secret Life a classic example of "ridiculously bad" Lifetime movies, noting it for its unintentional humor.[4]
References
edit- ^ a b Rife, Katie (21 April 2015). "How to navigate the weepy world of Lifetime movies". www.avclub.com. AV Club. Retrieved 7 September 2022.
- ^ Del Rio, Yvette (15 January 2018). "Lifetime Movie Review: Cyber Seduction". www.moviesofourlifetime.com. Movies of Our Lifetime. Retrieved 7 September 2022.
- ^ Musulin, Kristin. "Top 10 Lifetime movies that we love to hate-watch". www.usatoday.com. USA Today. Retrieved 7 September 2022.
- ^ Gatollari, Mustafa (23 October 2020). "Why Are Lifetime Movies So Ridiculously Bad?". www.distractify.com. Distractify. Retrieved 7 September 2022.