Lifetime Review: 'The Girl He Met Online'

Sometimes, movies work when you don't think they should. But when it comes to Lifetime, even the worst sounding plot or concept can be made into something entertaining in the hands of the right people. Initially, The Girl He Met Online (which was released a year after the bland Husband She Met Online) seemed like it was just a generic ripoff of Met Online's previous iteration. But surprisingly, the end product was a flawed but ultimately, an incredibly watchable flick.

At first glance, Gillian Casey (Yvonne Zima) might come across as a man's ideal fantasy. Young, blonde, and attractive, Gillian would seem more than capable of finding a man. But as the movie quickly establishes, Gillian is more than a little unbalanced. After being adopted by Agatha Casey (Mary-Margaret Humes), Gillian grew up resenting her adoptive mother and desperately searching for a man to love her. But despite her beauty and charm, Gillian's history of pathological jealousy and unstable mood swings inevitably leads to rejection.

After trashing her ex-beau Tony's house, Gillian takes to cyberspace looking for a new man and comes across businessman Andy Collins (Shawn Roberts). Handsome, wealthy, and family oriented, Andy is Gillian's dream come true and their relationship quickly blossoms once they meet in person. But as Gillian's old habits flare up and Andy's sister Heather (Samantha Madely) learns a secret of Gillian's, Gillian's dream come true starts to become Andy's worst nightmare....

Yvonne Zima's portrayal of Gillian is oft mentioned as being a low point for this film, but in hindsight, Zima's performance isn't as abysmal as viewers claim. It's not perfect, and Zima's flat and sometimes emotionless voice does hinder her supposed status as an alluring femme fatale, but in the deeper context of her character, Zima does her character justice. In a scene in which Gillian assaults Agatha for bringing up the possibility of Gillian moving out and finding her own place, Zima's delicate voice is disturbingly dissonant from her erratic behavior. It's also clear that behind her narcissism and violent bouts of rage, Gillian is a broken woman who believes finding the "perfect man" is the only way she can be whole. Her final scene in which she details what drove her off the deep end makes it clear that, at the end of the day, her grip on reality and the sense of right and wrong have withered away to almost nothing.

The protagonists, thankfully, also pull their weight, as a Lifetime movie where only the villain makes an impression feels incomplete. As played by Shawn Roberts, Andy Collins is a much more active (and far less naive) protagonist than Meredith Monroe's Rachel Maleman from The Husband She Met Online. While he does let much of the red flags he gets in regards to Gillian go, he never ignores the suspicion about them and is much quicker to realize something is off about his new lover than Rachel. In addition to that, Roberts exudes such charm and likability as Andy that most viewers will find it hard to hate on him.

(Plus, he's got dimples. How do you hate on a guy with dimples!?)

Really, everyone in the movie works hard to make their characters stand out, with Mary-Margaret Humes and Tara Spencer-Nairn (the latter of whom plays Gillian's sister Bethanny) giving a tragic sense of authenticity to their roles, making it clear that despite the love their characters have for Gillian, they can't find a way to get her the help she needs before it's too late. Another standout performance goes to Gary Hudson as Gillian's boss and illicit lover Dr. Harris Kohling, whose character is so unapologetically sleazy in the way only a well-written "love to hate" character can be.

While The Girl He Met Online is far from a perfect movie, it's the kind of Lifetime movie that can work simply by virtue of being entertaining and watchable. It's the kind of movie that would be perfect for a sleepover with your most sarcastic and witty friends to poke fun at over pizza. This is one of those movies that LMN likes to run a lot, so you'll definitely get a chance to watch and snark if you haven't already.

Score: 7 out of 10 staircase tumbles.