“… kind of like having a bunch of different coloured paper: it may look pretty, but at the end of the day they are just blank pages.”

Last night I decided to watch the Netflix film The Babysitter, and to my surprise it was actually pretty good. The Babysitter is a film about Cole, a twelve year-old boy who decides to stay up past his bed time to see what his babysitter gets up to when she believes him to be asleep. This proves to be a terrible idea when the night then turns into Cole being hunted by a group of teenagers who want him dead for witnessing something he shouldn’t have.

So why did I think The Babysitter would suck? Well first of all, the trailer was a little bit weird. It had some suspense elements, but the comedy portions didn’t feel to flow right with me. And really there was one thing that really kept my mind closed: King Bach. For those who don’t know, King Bach was a Vine star when Vine was still a thing, and his inclusion in this movie didn’t feel natural to me. I’m not speaking to Bach’s character or anything, but usually when a movie includes an Internet sensation it’s obviously a cash-grab at the expense of the quality of the film. Let’s just say I was legitimately surprised by Bach’s performance in The Babysitter. As a matter of fact, pretty much all of the performances in The Babysitter were good, especially Judah Lewis who played Cole. This kid is only 16 years-old and already he’s carrying movies essentially by himself? And you know, I just looked it up and apparently he played the kid in Demolition as well, so he’s got some serious chops.

But really the one thing, the only thing I can discuss when it comes to The Babysitter is just how stylized the movie is. I hate comparisons like: “Oh, it’s like Tarantino on steroids!”; but The Babysitter really was an amalgamation of a bunch of different directors’ styles. If you watch The Babysitter you’ll know immediately if the movie is for you or not. If you’re not into the stylization in the first five minutes, turn it off. Luckily this worked for me. I loved to see how weird this movie could get, and it got pretty fucking weird. The Babysitter really took a bunch of different styles, threw them together, and essentially ‘teenage-ized’ them. But unfortunately past all of the style, there was very little substance. It’s kind of like having a bunch of different coloured paper: it may look pretty, but at the end of the day they are just blank pages. I found that the story of The Babysitter, while interesting, took too long to get going. And then once it got there, it spent too long fucking around. I do admit that the movie was funny, and the effects (well, some of the effects) were great, but overall The Babysitter lacked anything substantial.

Overall The Babysitter wasn’t the best movie, but it was actually pretty fun. The film is so stylized it’s tough not to have a blast when you are watching it. If you’re looking for something to kill 90 minutes, look no further than The Babysitter.

I give The Babysitter a B