While the premise wiggles with promise of sinful delights, one has to be reminded while watching “The Client List” that this is a Lifetime Movie, therefore more interested in the mommy blues than the beast with two backs. A story of hooking, drug abuse, and harsh Texas judgment, the film elects for a soft route of melodrama, using pleasant actors to communicate desperation, refusing salacious details to play right to the target demographic of sympathetic mothers and wives.
It’s a little unsettling to approach a third entry in the unexpected “Open Season” franchise and find that, once again, most of the primary voices have been recast. It seems the title can’t keep a good star around. To combat this predicament, the producers have decided to do away with stunt casting all together. The result is a fresher, funnier sequel that executes slapstick comedy with more creative freedom, using its tiny budget and DTV status to find its own personal path of irreverence with these goofy forest creatures.
BRIAN ORNDORF 