Jodi Arias: Dirty Little Secret (2013) Reviews

• Brutal revenge by a woman scorned, Lifetime's surprisingly good Travis & Jodi story

  hsolaf2013-07-08

  Surprisingly well done! I expected much less, so I was very pleased. The movie starts out strikingly flashing forward to the sensual, last photo shoot between lovers Jodi and Travis. It then moves back to the beginning of a story of love, hate and obsession, a modern day fatal attraction parable. Males, beware of unbridled sex without love, it seems to say. There's always a price to pay. For Travis, it was the ultimate price.Based on the infamous and horrible murder everyone's heard about,it shows how two attractive, smart, young people, Travis and Jodi, meet, in a Sin City Convention. Travis is a motivational speaker. Jodi goes gaga over Travis. Soon, they make passionate love. She falls for him,strongly! Trying to be his significant other, she even becomes a Mormon like him. According to the well written, credible script, Travis, however,soon realizes Jodi is not marriage material.He takes his religion seriously, which requires chastity, but he can't stop having great loveless sex with Jodi! Travis loving, close Mormon friends think Jodi's unfit and obsessed, want him to get rid of her. So he goes underground with Jodi, as his "dirty little secret", for a sexual relation. When he realizes he's getting in over his head, that Jodi wants more,he tries to break off. She doggedly pursues him with menacing and sick stalking. Hurt and disenchanted that Travis has a new, marriage-material girlfriend, Jodi plans revenge by horridly killing him in a gruesome bloodbath. Visually, the cinematography is stylish, with lovely bright, photography of their lovemaking leading to its horrible, almost unbearable-to-look-at climax, in slow motion.Other visual water tricks are awesome,as when the camera moves from the spiritual to the sensual, from Jodi's Mormon baptism to her cavorting in a Jacuzzi with Travis. The actors are an unexpected treat, both the main ones and the supporting cast. Tania Raymonde as Jodi is uncanny-even better than the real Jodi! She's alluring and sexy, totally credible as a wolfish seductress posing as innocent Little Red Riding Hood. In minutes, the real Jodi blends into Tania,we forget Jodi for this better version. Her characterization is as good as can be, sassy, alluring, sexy,creepy. Her innocent, little girl act is as good as Arias'. Her angry, evil persona is terrible and fearful. Her look as she shoots Travis in the final ritual sacrifice is frightful.. I also found Jesse Lee Soffer very suitably cast as Travis. At first he looks lightweight and boyish, but as the story progresses he develops Travis into the charismatic and attractive guy Jodi would fall in love with. Soffer plays Travis with the right blend of innocence and roguishness.The scripted role makes his characterization human, sympathetic and likable. Not much is made in the script of Travis importance as big brother to his siblings.But the movie does make his awful death heartfelt, poignant and tragic. One is left with a sad sense of the pitiful loss of a valuable human being by an obsessed and vengeful monster, For a Lifetime movie, this movie surpassed all my expectations. The way the script treats Jodi's relation to her grandmother and friends humanizes her.It helps to soften her image without justifying her horrible deed. The last ten minutes summarizes the arrest and trial kind of shoddily, not enough development. One wishes to have it more leisurely treated in a Part II. Even as roughly sketched, Jodi's weird behavior during interrogation with Detective Alvarez and also, the subsequent Martinez badgering during the trial are witty and interesting, leaves you wanting more. This is certainly not a masterpiece, but as Lifetime movies go, an above average, respectable representation of a compelling real story. The fatal love story of Travis and Jodi is credible, engrossing, even thrilling. Would you believe the director's name is Jace Alexander, like the victim? Pretty good direction, for a speedy job.

• a balanced portrayal of a sensational story

  woernerdavid2013-06-24

  I felt the made-for-TV movie about Jody Arias was actually very good and was a balanced presentation of a sensational story. Jody Arias is obviously unbalanced, paranoid, has super-low self-esteem, and many other psychological defects. But as the story is shown, it also balances this with Travis Alexander's duplicity. He wanted to maintain the appearance of being a good, pious Mormon but kept Jody Arias as his secret life and kept her out of the mainstream of his life. When he tried to break up several times, he always ended up back in bed with Jody. He certainly did not deserve the terrible thing that happened to him, but he contributed his share. I thought the film was balanced and worth watching.

• Jodi Arias: Dirty Little Secret

  a_baron2014-06-20

  The 1997 film "Fatal Attraction" was nominated for 6 Academy Awards. This has been called the real life version for the 21st Century; sadly as a TV film it can't win an Oscar, even more sadly is the fact that it "is" the real life version. It probably wouldn't in any case because in spite of the excellent portrayal of "femme fatale" Arias by Tania Raymonde, like "To Catch A Killer" (about John Gacy) this was a film that was made with a higher purpose than mere entertainment. Although Jodi Arias was convicted of the murder of Travis Alexander only last year, it cannot be said to have been made entirely in indecent haste because the crime happened in June 2008, but it was released only a month after her conviction. The dialogue aims for realism rather than dramatic effect; the line "dildo with a heartbeat" was in fact used by Travis. As undoubtedly was Jodi's line "delete it and it's gone forever", except that it wasn't. Did she really expect to get away with murder? She was indeed his dirty little secret, and he could have treated her better, but did a man who had never so much as slapped his lover deserve to die at her hands like this? The only charge that may be made against this film – apart from the above one of indecent haste – is that it is bad taste to portray a real and recent murder so graphically. Far worse though was the release of the actual crime scene photographs, which could have been avoided even for a trial broadcast live on the Internet. In the UK this would not have been allowed, and Travis would at least have been granted dignity in death.

• Not bad

  perjensen-22013-06-23

  'Fatal Attraction' is an old story. Few cases have been chronicled, the most well known being Carolyn Warmus in the early 1990's. It too was in the national limelight, she was found guilty of murder, and not one but two movies were made telling the story. But as we know, the Jodi Arias story was more compelling because of the unexpected, lurid details of their deviant personal sanctum. No court case has ever presented to the public what should be rated X. All in all, "Dirty Little Secret" does the best it can do. There were only two people who could tell the real story, but one is dead and the other is a chronic liar. I'm sure there are many who will agree that Jodi Arias is a better actress than the woman who played her in this film. Thus there is no way a film can portray this story with pure accuracy. 'Artistic license' is unavoidable, and why this film struck me as an attempt to stay as close to what the producers knew at the time it was filmed. "Dirty Little Secret" may have its faults, but it's definitely worth seeing.

• Real life is scarier than fiction

  phd_travel2013-09-24

  This is a very well made dramatization of the Jodi Arias murder of Travis Alexander. Most people who watch the news this year would have seen images of the photos or Jodi testifying at trial. Now it comes to life on screen in a thorough and clear manner. Of course all the elements of a good movie are there already from the facts of the case: attractive young protagonists, sex, photos, obsession and a terrible murder. The story of the relationship is actually very interesting. The obsession and stalking behavior of Jodi is shown - a real life Fatal Attraction. Quite fascinating is seeing the values of the Mormon faith clash when a Mormon starts a relationship with a non Mormon. Felt sorry for the clean cut Travis struggling between his belief in abstinence until marriage and his desire for Jodi. The movie is balanced as it shows he was wrong to have keep sleeping with her after he know how obsessive and unhinged she was. The acting is quite good. Jesse Lee Soffer is sympathetic as the conflicted Travis. Tania Raymonde is just wacko looking enough - not too much for the obsessed Jodi. The murder itself is horrifying and they do show the killing - enough to know what happened though not too much that it would be sickening. Well done. Be prepared - it's much more affecting than any fictional stalker thriller movie.