USA (Tues., Jan. 18, 8 p.m. ET)
Of course, the appeal of this TV movie is essentially prurient. No reasonable viewer expects to be edified by the dramatization of a 35-year-old teacher's affair with a 13-year-old student and her imprisonment on a child rape charge. But if the film's main motive is exploitation, it does make some effort to develop the theme of twisted family values. Subtitled All-American Girl, it covers not only Mary Kay Letourneau's cradle robbery in the 1990s but also her upbringing in the home of the far-right father she idealized, former California Rep. John Schmitz. Penelope Ann Miller's Letourneau is morally blind but achingly sincere, and Omar Anguiano plays her young lover as a combination punk, seducer and underage knight in shining armor. An hour-long special after the movie features a jailhouse chat with Letourneau.
Bottom Line: Watchable tabloid tale
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