Casualties of Love: The Long Island Lolita Story

Plot synopsis:
Set on Long Island, the film opens with Joey Buttafuoco (Jack Scalia) playing drums, driving under influence of cocaine, fleeing from the cops and visiting his mother's grave. At home, his wife Mary Jo (Phyllis Lyons) awaits his return, disappointed in his drug back lapse. After she threatens to leave him if he does not quit using drugs, Joey decides to enter rehab. Six weeks later, he is a renewed man, promising his wife he is now the person again she fell in love with. Three years later, in the summer of 1991, he works in an auto repair shop, and meets 17-year-old Amy Fisher (Alyssa Milano), who begs Joey to repair her car without telling her parents. Joey agrees, even though he is a close acquaintance of her father Elliot (Jack Kehler). Amy frequently crashes her car, prompting her to make multiple visits to Joey. It does not take long before she starts coming on to him, making hints of her promiscuous past despite her young age. Even though he does not respond to her affection, Joey does not especially push her away and constantly pays her special attention.
One day at the carnival with her friend Lizzy (Georgia Emelin), Amy notices Joey and surprises him with a kiss. Joey is startled and immediately leaves. After he is gone, Amy claims to Lizzy that she has been dating him for a while now. The next day, Joey finds out that Elliot has filed a complaint with the police after Amy has claimed that Joey gave her herpes. Joey sets out to the Fisher residence to set things straight, and Amy eventually admits that she lied about the situation. Joey is outraged, though does not inform his wife, fearing that it will affect their marriage. Later, at a cafe, Joey assures Amy that he has no interest in leaving his wife and children, and ignores her when she shows to him that she is wearing his car repair shop t-shirt. By now, Amy is madly in love with Joey and thinks that the only thing holding them apart is Mary Jo. She hires a contract killer to kill Mary Jo - paying him $600 and allowing him to sleep with her - though the young man eventually chickens out.
Six months later, she shows up at the Buttafuoco residence once again and claims to Mary Jo that Joey is having an affair with her "16-year-old sister", showing him Joey's car repair shop t-shirt to "prove" her claim. When Mary Jo refuses to believe her, Amy takes out her gun and shoots Mary Jo in the head. Later at the hospital, Joey is informed that his wife's situation is critical and that she might be paralyzed for the rest of her life, if she does not die. Amy, meanwhile, sets out to her boyfriend Paul (Michael Bowen), who is in a relationship with another woman, for comfort. Back in the hospital, a severely injured Mary Jo informs Joey and the detectives that her attacker owned his repair shop t-shirt. Joey then realizes Amy shot Mary Jo. Following her arrest, Amy claims that she and Joey both conspired to kill Mary Jo, enabling them to spend their life together. Joey denies any of Amy's claims, and swears to the cops that he was never involved with her. In the media, Joey is frequently mentioned as an adulterer and conspirer, causing even Mary Jo to question her husband.
Even though he is advised to not set out to the media, Joey decides to make an official report after the media releases a sex tape of Amy and an older man. It is claimed that Joey forced her into a life of prostitution, and that the older man of the tape was one of her clients. In prison, Amy continues to make love claims to Joey, now through letters. During the court case, Amy's bail is set at $2 million, the highest in New York state history, and Joey is tarnished by reporters. He tries to stand by his wife, but Mary Jo is confused by all the "evidence" that's coming up in court, "proving" Joey is guilty. She blames him for not being able to protect her, though she does not leave him.
By August 1992, bail for Amy is made by a TV network working to adapt her story. Joey's life falls more apart when he is informed that the entire Buttafuoco family will lose the auto repair shop if it is proven that he had an affair with Amy (the pressure causes his father to have a heart attack). The Buttafuocos want to allow Amy to have a plea bargain, or else her attorney will destroy the family company. Even though Mary Jo objects to the situation, reminding her family that she is the victim here, Amy is allowed a deal in court: she will receive 5 to 15 years for "reckless assault". Pleas of "attempted murder" among others are dropped, so the D.A. can come after Joey Buttafuoco for statutory rape. Soon after, a video tape is released in which Amy brags about her plea, and asks Paul to marry her. The tape allows the Buttafuocos to clear their name, while Amy receives the maximum sentence of 15 years in prison.

Tags: tragedy, murder, melodrama

Review:
A True American Tragedy.
The story about an event that shook up a quiet Long Island community back in 1992 and became front page and headline news in all the tabloid newspapers and TV shows not just in the USA but all over the world as well.
The movie "Casualties of Love" tries to portray Joey "Butterfingers" Buttafuoco in a good light, in this sordid and sleazily episode of suburban life on the Island, but fails miserably in light of what has transpired since the movie's release back in 1993.
Early in the film we see Joey, Jack Scalia, recovering from a serious coke-drug addiction habit and getting back to a normal life working for his father old man Buttafuoco, Lawrence Tierney, as a auto-mechanic in his car body repair shop and meets one fateful afternoon a very attractive but emotional disturbed and unstable young Amy Fisher, Alyssa Milano, and the rest is history.Amy getting her sights on the good-natured and overly friendly Joey and becoming infatuated with him gets her car smashed up a number of times just to have an excuse to be around and close to Joey and even going so far as trying to get poor and innocent Joey alone in his office and induce him to have sex with her can't seem to budge, the rock hard and straight as an arrow happily married family man, in having Joey commit an act of adultery.
With Joey chivalrously turning down all of her sexual advances a frustrated and mad as hell Amy then plans to have the one person standing in the way between her and Joey his wife Mary Jo, Phyllis Lyon, put out of the picture permanently.After unsuccessfully trying to get some of her friends in school to assassinate Mary Jo by giving them money and "free sex" Amy goes to the Buttafuoco's residence and tries to do the job herself by shooting Mary Jo in the head and leaving her paralyzed for life.The movie tries very hard to make Joey look innocent by reason of being too naive and, well let's just say, stupid in not realizing what Amy's intentions really were and how far she would go to take him away from Mary Jo and his two children thus in some way trying to make Joey look not responsible for what happened to Mary Jo.The movie also goes to great lengths to show the audience that Joey didn't have an affair with the underage Amy but it's not very convincing since the release of the movie Joey pleaded guilty to having sex with the 17 year-old Amy Fisher which in New York state is considered statutory rape that landed him in jail for six months and since then Joey was arrested a number of times for soliciting prostitutes for sex which makes the Joey Buttafuoco in the movie look both phony and ridicules.
Amy since her release from prison became a writer for a local Long Island newspaper, The New Island Ear, and seems to have put her life back together but Joey, besides his arrests for soliciting prostitutes, was just indited in California for insurance fraud.
The Buttafuoco/Fisher affair destroyed both of the Buttafuoco and Fisher families with Joey's father losing his business that he built up and worked at for almost fifty years and almost cost Joey's wife, Mary Jo, her life and ultimately ended their marriage.
It also destroyed Amy's parents marriage as well has having her put behind bars for almost ten years and being brutalized, and reportedly raped by a male prison guard, while she was in prison.
This story, the Buttafuoco/Fisher affair, turned out to be a true modern day American Tragedy..
Narcissists.
A depressing tale of a middle-aged man and teen-aged girl who have an affair, presumably, after which the girl shoots the guy's wife in the head, so that the girl and the guy can get married, or at least live together, happily ever after.
It's based on the real events surrounding Aimee Fisher and Joey Buttafuco.
She's played my Alyssa Milano, in probably her most demanding role, and the car mechanic is Jack Scalia.
What a tawdry tale.
A narcissistic pedophile and a spoiled pretty nymphomaniac.
Lots of sex, intrigue, conflict, some violence, all rather disgusting, which is probably why three independent TV made-for movies about the case hit the TV screens at the same time.
This one is definitely from Butaffuco's point of view.
The poor guy loves his wife and children (sob) and never touches this succulent nymphet.
Fisher is plumply overdeveloped, more than simply enticing, bursting her seams, and she's the aggressor and the liar in the tale.
Buttafuco is the innocent victim.
Right.
No ex coke addicted, pumped up, self-admiring Italian philanderer would dream of laying a paw on this fawning young creature.
Man, is he put upon.
Our eyes water at the narrative.
Aimee lies to her family and tells them that Joey gave her herpes.
Then tries to murder his wife.
And all this time he's nothing more than a cheerful, loving, family man and upright citizen, aghast at all the terrible things he's accused of.
Did he fund this movie?
The other two made-fors took quite different points of view, depending on who was backing the production and which particular participant in this disgusting tale was doing the endoresements.
Utterly revolting garbage, which the public ate up.
Alyssa Milano is a beautiful young woman.
Anyone who wants to see her en deshabille should rent "Kiss of the Vampire" or whatever it was, far sexier, and less repugnant simply because it is more mindless.
This movie actually has a point of view.
It could have skipped the sleazy plot and just shown us Joey pumping iron in a gym and Aimee coupling in some stranger's back seat.
An insult to the public viewer, who gobbled it down with relish..
A ludicrous travesty.
Turned-on set to this just as it was beginning on "Lifetime," and had intended to go to another channel.
But it was one of those instances where you watched for a minute or two, then another, then another..., etc.I could see at the outset that it presented Buttafuoco differently from the clownish lout I remembered from this whole well-publicized course of events.As I watched, I looked at the prior comments here, which quickly confirmed this.
The actor portraying him was handsome, especially not having the real guys' homely, thin-lipped, weak mouth, and a facial look which cries out for the description "smarmy."One wouldn't have thought it possible to present the Amy Fisher character, on-screen, as being a worse person than she actually was in real life -- but this flick managed to accomplish that almost seemingly-impossible task.As I watched, I still expected that there might be some indication towards the very end of his duplicity, and at least a modicum of responsibility on his shoulders for her entering his home and shooting his wife point-blank in her face.
But there was not even at least some oblique reference on this point.The scenes between Buttafuoco and the local pair of policemen even made it appear that they should show more feeling for him and have greater understanding than was displayed.
And his watching television with wife, father and son, as a tape displayed by a lover of hers was exposing her slutty side, could have been the Cleavers, say, watching a broadcast, exonerating Wally or Beaver from some local minor mischief which might have been suspected.,Hard to feel any sympathy whatever for these folks, except the lady shot point-blank, and Pop, with his lifelong business placed in jeopardy.The two or three times I've seen the real Joey on the tube, even a long time following these events, completely confirmed: this guy is a homely, cocky, smarmy asshole, the opposite of the portrayal by the actor in this flick, on all counts..
Awesome and Horrible at the same time..
Wow, this is wicked awesome.
I was sitting around this Saturday afternoon, looking for something to watch and Lo and Behold "Long Island Lolita Story" appears on the TV.
On the Lifetime network - of course!
This is the same channel I've seen such classics as "No One Would Tell" starring Kevin Arnold and DJ Tanner and "Unwed Father" starring David Silver from the original 90210.Anyway, its clear Joey Buttafuoco was totally 100% innocent.
I mean sure...he actually pled guilty to statutory rape, and in the ensuing years he's been arrested for fraud and solicitation of hookers, so you see, he's just a real nice guy that just was hit on by a slutty long island Lolita, he never slept with her or did anything wrong!
Watch this movie any chance you get!.
Ridiculous.....
This movie should have never even been created let alone shown on TV.
As a hundred percent of the comments say this was telling it from Joey's side which was not the truth.
This movie was not based on facts at all!
Absolute TRASH!.
Rushed tale from Joey's perspective.
I live on Long Island and at the time the next town over from Amy Fisher.
THis is what was going around after this came down.
First is the only reason this case became so popular even before the trial or anything was know about the characters involved it because the press was at the scene as son as it happened.
Not the usual amount of press but big time press WHy?
Because the Buttafucoes lived on the same block of a Mafia associate and they thought the shooting happened at his resident..thus all the press coverage.
Secondly I remember Mary Joe being in big time denial about her husband.
Her mother even said she wished she had married a man as good as Joey.
She actually lost a lot of sympathy because of that.
People saw Joey and Amy together all of the time.
He made no secret of the affair.
He even took his kids with them on a few outings.
Whatever the case the man was to old to be dealing with a confused teenager.
there was no doubt where I lived he was sleeping with her and leading her on.
His family's auto body place was on the corner of Grand Ave. and Merrick rd A major street in Baldwin.
I passed it a million times but never paid attention to it until the shooting.
After that people would drive to that corner just to get a glance of Joey.
He actually became a minor celeb on Long Island.
This did not help his case,because he was real cocky people thought he should of gotten locked up because he had to have something to do with the shooting.
We knew Amy was fast but the guys were always men who were too old for her.
She had a lot of family problems.
I always felt very bad for her mother.
She seemed to have gone through a lot.
People would go to the motels they went to and try to stay in the rooms they stayed in.
It was a joke.
In any case Amy shot his wife and she was wrong but he should of went to jail too.
Now on to the movie.
Jack Scalia is a very good looking slim Joey.
believe me the real life Joey was not a looker.
He plays him as a man who was stalked by this teenager, and never touched her.
Well we all know that was not true because motel clerks/receipts attested to the opposite.
he should of known better.
Allyssa Milano plays a very good looking Amy. Amy by no means was a Fox is portrayed as a predatory sex fiend.
She was fast but not without Joeys help.
The woman who plays Mary Jo is the truest role on the movie, she sounds and looks just like Mary Jo. THe location of the movie is not Long Island and it doesn't come close.
One scene Joey is at a carnival and asks Amy why came so far.
Well Massapequa is only around 15 minutes away from Merrick.
THese are all south shore towns and Sunrise Hwy goes right through them all.
And Merick is only 4 towns away.
So the dialog couldn't even get the locations right.
I figure at least get the area correct.
Amy went to jail and she should of.
Joey and Mary Jo moved to California he actually thought he could get into the movie business.
The auto body shop which had been there for years closed down...very sad.
Amy is out of jail now and she has a newspaper column which is very good.
the Buttofucco's are divorced.
Mary Jo seems to reconciled to the fact her hubby was not all innocent.
But what is more interesting is that she has forgiven AMy which I thought would never happened.
I really think Mary Jo is a strong woman now.
What they should do is make a movie about the incident now, it is a true American Tragedy, but in the end things seem to turn out OK.
This movie was rushed just like the other Amy Fisher movies and it shows.
I liked that Lawrence Tierney plays the dd another very sympathetic person in this whole mess.
Like Amy's mother he seemed like the whole world was on his shoulder and his auto body shop closed down..
This film is not very good.
That is the best thing I can say about this shocking piece of work.
Very bad acting.
Hilarious at times.
Did anyone pay money to see this?
It is wrong on so many levels.
It reminded me of a soft porn in parts.
I watched this with my cat and he even thought it so crap he got up and left the room.
I think that maybe this film had potential if the script was ripped up and urinated on it.
Amy Fisher is dangerous.
That is a fact.
"Serial killers don't get 2million bail", so true.
A 17 year old kid.
That is the story.
I checked out the credits for the directors name and surprised to find out that he made good few film after this one.
10/10 for my patience to see this film all the way through.
It was a test in the finest art of torture.
Classic hair cut on that bloke.He's 37?
Good one.
Look more like 52.
The wife is probably the worst actor ever.
But it hard to say who is the worst ever, because so many of the worst actors ever to be on my TV screen were all piled into one when they made this.
The best part was when the wife sets off the metal detector with the bullet in her head..
This Movie is a Cartoon!.
This movie is nothing but a cheesy waste of time garbage cartoon.
It had nothing noteworthy in it.
Bad acting, bad costumes, bad directing, nonsense script, cheap production, and too much of a lie.This movie tells a ton of lies about what happened.
This movie is a total fictional lie about this case.
Amy's version is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
The Buttafuoco's except for Mary Jo all lie, lie, lie.
I give this movie no stars at all.
What a waste of time and money.
Sorry mom.Next time I'm gonna choose a better movie.
In the end all I can say to the director is, make better quality films if you want people to watch them.
I think it's time to make a movie out of Amy's book If I Knew Then.