The Babysitters is an independent film that changes the scope of prostitution and puts it squarely on the shoulders of high school girls. The film interested me because John Leguizamo is in it, and as a Latino, I kind of like his skills. Although, truth be told, I find his best work was done in the meth movie “Spun”, which is a favorite of mine. This film follows the boring suburbia life a few teenagers that get caught up in a world of sex.
A babysitter has sex with her employer and that starts a chain reaction. The movie then goes onto be a public service announcement of sorts about the dangers of prostitution and instead of showing explicit details, it shows you formality problems. For instance, our main character and head girl ends up getting frustrated when a rival starts taking away her business. It’s the kind of problem that leads to bickering and violence, but it never gets too over the top. In fact, this movie is a lot tamer than I thought, considering the subject matter.
The Babysitters is an obvious independent film. The framing of shots, the way the camera moves, the edits, and the musical montages and ques are all independent film standards. It is either hit or miss with the audience, because at times you need more than the 20 second locking of eyes to kissing, to mysterious elbow or body part to avoid showing too much skin.
Writer and Director David Ross puts together an alright film. It’s not insane, but it touches on too many subjects too lightly to be good. The twist at the end, and overall violence is somehow muted. The best part of the whole film is the way the main character cries as if she’s some innocent kid, as she sees her own father involved with one of the girls that is supposed to be “babysitting”.
The Babysitters is not the greatest film in the world, and many critics already slammed it. However, I thought it held my attention long enough to watch it through the end. I don’t recommend it to everyone, as this really feels like a poor man’s Gus Van Sant or Sofia Coppola, and it’ll be interesting to see if this film will catch on later on in its dvd tenure much like “The Virgin Suicides” seems to be getting a lot more attention than when it was out in theaters.
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