| If Someone Had Known | |
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DVD cover |
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| Directed by | Eric Laneuville |
| Written by | Alan Landsburg Susan Cuscuna Michael Petryni |
| Starring | Kellie Martin Kevin Dobson Linda Kelsey Ivan Sergei |
| Music by | Laura Karpman |
| Cinematography | Paul Elliott |
| Editing by | Karen I. Stern |
| Distributed by | NBC |
| Release date(s) | May 1, 1995 |
| Running time | 80 minutes |
| Country | USA |
| Language | English |
If Someone Had Known is a 1995 television film based on a true story, directed by Eric Laneuville. Although the film received no critical acclaim, Kellie Martin was praised for her 'believable performance'.[1] Writers Alan Landsburg, Susan Cuscuna and Michael Petryni received the Christopher Award for their teleplay. Originally aired on NBC, the film is nowadays frequently re-aired on Lifetime and sister channel Lifetime Movie Network.[2]
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Katie Liner is the attractive 18-year-old daughter of Jack Liner, a powerful police officer. At one of his benefit parties, she meets Jimmy Pettit, a young man in his early twenties she soon starts dating. Initially, he seems the perfect guy: he is well-educated, respectful, polite, popular and has no records with the police. Nevertheless, Jack is not sure about the guy and when he finds out that Katie is engaged, he is not enthusiastic. Things are going fast, though, and in a short period of time, Katie and Jimmy are married and she gives birth to a son.
Soon, Katie finds out that Jimmy is not the perfect man he seems to be on the outside. He starts to show violent behavior, pushing and hitting her. Apologizing afterwards makes Katie forgive him every time. Her older sister Sharon notices the bruises, and Katie admits the truth, but forces her to keep quiet. By the time she is pregnant with her second baby, his aggressive behavior worsens, as he also starts to hit their son Jamie. Desperate, she admits to her mother that she is a victim of domestic violence. Ellen convinces her to leave him, but Jimmy is not willing to let go of his wife and beats her up severely. When he threatens to shoot her, she defends herself by killing him with a gunshot.
Katie is arrested and admits to her lawyer that she is guilty, although claiming that she still loves her husband. Jack is shocked to find out she was abused and has trouble accepting that she did not turn to him with her problems. He tries to discourage her from taking the case to trial, explaining she could be sentenced for life. Katie thinks she stands a chance, though, wanting to show the jury that she was abused. She also starts to realize that Jack verbally abuses Ellen, and confronts him with it (also pointing out that she never came to him about the abuse in fear he would become overprotective of her in the future). Realizing that it is the truth, he tries to better his life and apologizes to his wife (In one particular scene, he has a possible domestic violence perpetrator arrested, despite being a friend of the man).
Once the trial begins, Katie has trouble proving the intensity of the domestic violence and is harassed by Jimmy's brother Doug, who wants revenge for the killing. Additionally, the fact that none of the witnesses reported the violence starts to work against her (the prosecuting attorney forces Sharon to give only a "yes" or "no" answer to whether she did or not, plus one of their neighbors, an older man, explained he grew up during a time when whatever happened between another couple was "their business"). When Katie testifies, she admits she was naive enough to believe if she provided unconditional love to Jimmy that he would eventually stop abusing her, but finally realized that was never going to happen, and that one of them was going to kill the other. She is found not guilty by the jury and even Jimmy's parents, who at first wanted her in prison for the murder, sympathize with her.
The film ends with Katie laying a flower at Jimmy's grave, then telling Jamie that they will have a better life.
The film was released on DVD in 2005 by MPI Home Video, one of a number of TV films issued under their "True Stories Collection" banner.
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