Average Telemovie I own all of the VC Andrews books, some I like, some I don't.
I liked the Rain series so when I heard about the movie I decided to give it a chance, some of us remember the travesty of the "Flowers in The Attic" movie.
Young Brooklyn did a decent job in this movie as the title character Rain. However at times I found her acting fell a little short and this jolted me out of the flow of the story. The scene at the cemetery at her mothers grave was particularly notable as being slightly unbelievable with her portrayal of grief.
However her performance with Khandi Alexander (what a legend!), who played Latitia Arnold was fantastic, I'm guessing Khandi's skill and experience helped immensely in those scenes.
The actress who played Megan was very pretty but her acting was very amateurish, I felt like they grabbed someone off the street and held up cue cards. However the actress playing Victoria did a fabulous job and really brought the character to life, great casting! I particularly enjoyed the interactions between Rain and Mrs Hudson (Dunaway). Dunaway did a fabulous job with her portrayal of Mrs Hudson, however again there was a jarring moment of over-acting in the bedroom after Rain and Mrs Hudson had the argument about the pacemaker operation, Dunaway's flustered hand waving and gabbling made me cringe.
The overall flow of the story was well done. You can almost never replicate the novel so they way they trimmed down the details and moved the story along was actually quite well done, this movie felt like a prequel (which it should, as the book itself was part of a series) and therefore felt a little unfinished with a slightly unsatisfying ending.
Others have criticised the inclusion of the gang coming after Rain, however I felt it added a more interesting angle in the story and it didn't detract too much from the plot.
I was slightly surprised to see the inclusion of Mrs. Hudson and Jake's relationship this early into the movies (if they make further sequels) however if they are using it to foreshadow other plot elements from later books in the series then I understand.
Overall I give this movie a 5 out of 10 as I felt some parts of it were amateurish and the casting raised a few question marks for me, however I felt that it was a solid low budget movie which will pass an hour or so on a boring afternoon for many people.