The Babysitters

Just saw this film at TIFF (Toronto International Film Festival). The director was there and participated in the Q&A. The film was entertaining, I'll give it that much, however the major problems stem from it just doesn't feel like the film-making team really knew what kind of film they wanted to make. The tone is muddled and therefore you're never really sure how to feel about most of the situations. The sex scenes are probably the most interesting of the film, and mostly because that's really the only time where we really see the characters and what they're going through. Cynthia Nixon and John Leguzamo play a married couple, and although they're both cast well and play the parts well I find it very hard to believe them as a couple at all. I think that the writing and portrayal of their characters is fine, it just doesn't fit. The director/writer seems to prefer going after internal conflict rather than external, the main problem is that in the end we never really get a sense of how this whole story has affected everyone. We're left on a very vague not that I think hurts the film more than helps it. That and it kinda/sorta felt like a newer take on 'Pizza Boy' with Patrick Dempsy (and from a marketing point MILFS are way more interesting than... oh my... FILFs?)

This is what I look for in independent film. Well drawn characters, competent movie making, and a pleasing ambiguity that a big studio wouldn't dare leave in, lest the audience actually decide how to feel for themselves. The guys are great - desperate, sleazy, charming, funny and sad. The girls are also portrayed fairly - scheming, sweet, sexy and innocent. Leguizamo's character is believable to me as an aging playa, chafing against middle age and lusting for Waterson's Shirley. And Shirley is the best on-screen pimp in recent memory. To be fair: things unfold a little quickly, people accept their situations a little easier than they might in real life, but this is a pretty short movie, and throwing in more angst would be overkill and overlong on screen. No one comes away clean, and no one comes away as the absolute bad guy. Moral absolutes would kill this film, and I'm glad it got made the way it did.

The sole reason for why I picked up "The Babysitters" was because of John Leguizamo being in it. Having read the synopsis for the movie, and that wasn't particularly a selling point for me. So, for me, the movie was depending on John Leguizamo to carry it - and so he did.

The story in "The Babysitters" is about a young girl who babysits for a family, and whilst driving her home in the evening, the dad invites her in to a diner for something to eat. Here they come to talk and a spark is set off between them. The dad ends up having sex with the babysitter. Eventually his friend finds out and wants in on the deal, and the babysitter bring in her friends to help servicing these adult men who have wives and kids. And business is good for the 'babysitters'.

Storywise, then "The Babysitters" doesn't really blow you away - pardon the pun. The story is good enough in itself, although it does deal with a taboo subject, so the movie may not be suitable for just anyone.

What made the movie watchable was the acting in the movie, because people really did great jobs with their given roles and characters. And also the characters in the movie were really fleshed out nicely and in great detail.

"The Babysitters" is a story- and character-driven movie, so don't expect the movie to get up into a fast pace at any given moment.

If you enjoy dramas that deal with issues that are not common day events - controversial events you might say - then "The Babysitters" might be just the right movie for you.

After she ends up having sex with one of her customers, a teenager decides to turn her babysitting job into an illicit escort agency, with herself and her friends as the call-girls. Things are great at first, but the reality of the situation she has put herself and her friends in starts to take its toll.

I'll be honest – even before I started to watch 'The Babysitters', I wasn't feeling great about it. A decent cast of good but unimpressive actors; a handful of sexy girls there to just be sexy; and a play on that lovely babysitter fantasy. It was destined to be failure.

And, well, it's a failure.

It's a failure mainly because it's so predictable. It was clear to see where it was going, and writer/director David Ross never really challenges our expectations – if anything, he goes out of his way to make sure everything goes as we imagined it would. Very boring.

Another problem is that Katherine Waterston (playing central character Shirley), as gorgeous as she is, just isn't a very good actor. If you're going to base your film around a young actor, that actor better be good, and we didn't get that here. She's not absolutely awful, she has her moments, but nothing sustained enough to make it a performance worth investing in. The big name in the film is John Leguizamo. I liked his character, and the man is obviously a fantastic actor, but he's wasted here. Similarly, Cynthia Nixon is barely there, and doesn't have a lot to do.

I feel I should balance this out with a positive from the movie, but I'm at a loss as to what that might be. If I would praise anything, it would be the performance of Lauren Birkell, as Shirley's best friend Melissa. She is the kooky, quirky one, and does it very well. It's a spirited performance, the kind of performance someone gives when they're doing best to get noticed. But it's one shining light in a badly-made film.

'The Babysitters' is watchable, but you're not going to enjoy it too much. If you're happy to put up with a boring script if it means you get some lovely eye candy, please do watch this, as you get a healthy dose of both things. If you like your films, y'know, good, avoid it.

The well-acted indie drama "The Babysitters" takes what appears on the surface to be fairly salacious and distasteful material and turns it into a scathing attack on contemporary mores and values.

Shirley (Katherine Waterston) is an attractive suburban high school student who decides to make a little extra money babysitting for the young son of a local couple. When the husband, Michael (John Leguizamo), who is clearly unhappy in his marriage, pays to have sex with her at the end of the night, Shirley comes up with a scheme to parlay that into a full-fledged teen-prostitution ring, with Michael lining up other clients among his married buddies and Shirley setting herself up as a sort of "madam," "hiring" her friends from school to serve as under-aged "call girls." But the folks involved soon discover that, when it comes to affairs of the heart and of the loins, one can't always dictate how things will turn out.

Writer/director David Ross aims at a wide range of targets, from the sterility of suburbia and middle class marriage to middle-aged men who refuse to grow up – and who, instead of serving as moral guides for the girls, are willing to exploit them for their own perverted needs - to the capitalist system itself, at least as embodied by the "enterprising" young entrepreneur, Shirley, who often has to stoop to ruthless and dictatorial tactics to ensure the viability and survival of her business.

But always, beneath it all, there is the intense sadness and emotional emptiness of the situation, as these attractive young ladies - who are really just confused and insecure kids under all the makeup, sexy clothing and alluring bravado - find themselves getting into something they can neither fully understand nor fully control. Even Michael seems unable to separate the sex from his own more romantic feelings for Shirley as he battles with jealousy thinking about her with other men. Perhaps, the most indicting line of dialogue comes from one of the creepier gents who cluelessly proclaims that one day, when these girls are all grown up, they will look back on this time as one of the greatest of their lives. Yet, paradoxically, the exploitation goes both ways, as these "naïve" girls, particularly Shirley, wrap a bunch of immature middle-aged men around their little fingers, ultimately using the men's uncontrollable libido against them.

It is this complicated twist that gives the film its darkly humorous tone and makes "The Babysitters" more than just a titillating and exploitative exercise in finger-wagging moral umbrage.