If There Be Thorns (film)
| If There Be Thorns | |
|---|---|
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| Genre | Drama Romance Thriller |
| Based on |
If There Be Thorns by V. C. Andrews |
| Screenplay by | Andy Cochran |
| Directed by | Nancy Savoca |
| Starring |
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| Theme music composer | Douglas Pipes |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Original language(s) | English |
| Production | |
| Executive producer(s) |
Dan Angel Lisa Hamilton Daly Charles W. Fries Tanya Lopez Jane Startz Rob Sharenow Kane Lee (co-executive producer) |
| Producer(s) |
Richard D. Arredondo Harvey Kahn |
| Cinematography | James Liston |
| Editor(s) | Mark Shearer |
| Running time | 100 minutes |
| Production company(s) |
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| Distributor | Lifetime Pictures |
| Release | |
| Original network | Lifetime |
| Original release |
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| Chronology | |
| Preceded by | Petals on the Wind |
| Followed by | Seeds of Yesterday |
| External links | |
| Website | |
If There Be Thorns is a 2015 television film based on the 1980s best-seller novel of the same name. It premiered on April 5, 2015 and was produced by Lifetime.
Six years after Petals on the Wind, Cathy and Chris are happily married and living in California with Cathy's sons, Jory and Bart. Bart feels lonely and outshone by his older brother whom his parents seemingly favour. One day, a woman entirely dressed in black moves into the mansion next door and invites Bart and Jory over for tea and cookies. During this, she explains to them that she is rich but has no family except for her butler, John Amos. She takes a picture of them for a keepsake, and asks them to visit her often. Jory declines, but Bart agrees after she promises to give him anything he wishes for. Bart is curious as to why he has no other relatives, both he and Jory being aware that Chris is merely their step-father. Jory tells him that their maternal grandmother is in a mental hospital and that all of Chris's relatives are deceased. The woman lavishes treats and gifts on Bart, including a pet python, and eventually tells him that she's in fact his grandmother, Corrine. John Amos gives Bart a journal that belonged to his great-grandfather, Malcolm, and makes him promise never to reveal it to his family. Bart reads Malcolm's fanatical entries and writings, referring to beautiful women as sinful and degrading, which begins to leave a deep impression on him.
One night, Cathy places three beds in the house attic, which worries Chris about her behaving similarly to their mother. However, Cathy insists that she is only creating a back-up plan in case her and Chris's incestuous secret is ever exposed and they face the possibility of losing her children. She pleads with Chris to adopt Cindy, one of her ballet students, whose mother has died from cancer, and he agrees in order to calm her down about losing their family. Bart soon goes missing and the family discover him unconscious in the woods due to an infected cut on his arm, leading him to be hospitalized. Bart starts to suspect that his parents are keeping secrets from him, and he confronts Corrine over a painting of a boy who resembles Chris since he believed she had never met him. Corrine confesses that Cathy and Chris are actually both her children, leaving him horrified at his parents' incestuous relationship.
Bart starts to withdraw and lash out at his family, greatly worrying them. Bart begins to pressure Corrine to tell him about his biological father, about whom he knows nothing. John Amos continues to influence Bart regarding the sins and hypocrisy of the family, further straining his relationship with his parents and brother. Jory soon finds the family dog killed, and begins to believe Corrine responsible for the change in Bart. He tries to convince Bart to stay away from her, but Bart blackmails him into staying quiet and calls him weak for feeling emotion. Feeling pressured by Bart, Corrine admits that his biological father is her late second husband whom Cathy seduced to get back at her. Corrine then reveals how she wants Bart to become the child that she never got to have with his father, vengefully wishing to steal him away from her daughter.
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