The Sitter review
Remember how “Due Date” was like a worse “Planes Trains and Automobiles”? Well “The Sitter” is the lazy, mostly unfunny “Adventures in Babysitting.” And it’s really a shame. While chasing audience approval, former indie-film director David Gordon Green (who whiffed once already this year with the ambitious but inadequate stoner comedy “Your Highness”) seems to be getting further and further away from anything resembling a good movie. Jonah Hill stars as Noah Griffith, a twenty-something (we’re assuming) slacker who agrees to babysit a trio of kids so his divorced mom can go on a date with a rich dude. Along the way his pseudo-girlfriend Marisa (Ari Graynor) manipulates him into agreeing to bring her some coke to a party and then she’ll finally have sex with him. At no point does this seem like a good or reasonable idea but presumably a madcap adventure will follow. At every turn reason is thrown out the window and the laughs just don’t come often or steady enough for you to overlook the logic-defying decisions these loosely drawn characters are supposedly making.
Hill is better than this and if there was a darker, more interesting film on the page (and from the interviews with Green, that seems to be the case) it’s all been removed from the current version of the film which feels hacked to pieces running a scant 82 minutes. It’s no easy feat that the film still manages to drag through one lifeless setpiece to the next. Green needs a career intervention because a successful mimic he is not. If he was going for an “After Hours” style romp, he’s missed it by a mile. The characters actions are unmotivated and unbelievable, playing by a loose ‘movie logic’ that allows some characters (like Sam Rockwell’s needy drug dealer) to be as broad as they want to be. But ‘Babysitting’ wasn’t the only superior film that came to mind while watching this lazy muddle, it also bears some striking resemblances to “Date Night.” Yes, Shawn Levy, director of the laughless trilogy of “Cheaper By The Dozen,” “Night At The Museum” and “The Pink Panther” managed to do a better job with a similar premise.
I’d worry that this film might “Norbit” Hill’s awards momentum for his excellent performance in “Moneyball” but more than likely this movie will be forgotten about in a week’s time with few witnesses to speak of. Green, on the other hand, needs more help getting his career back into gear. His next project sounds more promising so let’s hope this will be the last time the former auteur tries his hand at appeasing some imaginary “mass audience.” Green needs to start trusting himself again before we can start trusting him.
