It’s time for an old school horror title that throws in a good amount of misdirection with its twists and turns. Usually old school horror films tend to be pretty strong but ultimately I can’t say that this one was a winner. The slow burn approach just doesn’t work without some kind of a big monster or threatening murderer at the ready. Instead most of the scares are really around the fact that the main character is just a kid and can’t really do a whole lot.

The story begins with Joey finally returning home after having been away from home at a sort of recovery institution for 2 years. Unfortunately the staff were not able to get through to him and even right up to the end he was very mean spirited and pulling pranks on people. His parents had hoped he would have improved but that was wishful thinking. If anything he had gotten worse as he is openly disrespectful to the Nanny. He treats her like a monster and for the most part she takes this in stride but there is a lot of tension in the air. Who is the real villain of this story?

So the first weakness of the movie is really just that it’s not terribly interesting. I like there to be some tension between the characters in a classic mystery as you have to read between the lines and understand the veiled threats. It just doesn’t work nearly as well when the main character is just a kid. There’s nothing that Joey can really do here and he has long since given up on trying to convince his parents. At least from the film’s context it sounds like he had tried in the past and it didn’t go so well so now he is content to just hint at things and generally pick on the Nanny.

In a way we probably should have seen some of the events before he went away to boarding school because it would make Joey a lot less annoying in the present. He makes one friend at least, the upstairs neighbor Bobbie. This at least gives him someone to talk to and some attempt at banter but of course he isn’t really able to keep up.

There’s also not a whole lot that Bobbie can do from her side because this is such a family affair. Joey often appears to be on the losing side of every interaction with the Nanny and again that’s to be expected since he’s a kid. The film would have absolutely been stronger if he had just been older.

As for the parents, they really don’t look very good at all. The mother is constantly depressed and so she’s not really able to understand what is going on here. She mostly mopes a lot and seems to be living in a different reality. She is shocked every single time Joey says something mean to the Nanny and you would expect that at some point she would at least be able to predict what was about to happen. She doesn’t even have to take Joey’s side but should at least know what is going on. She blames herself for the Nanny never having a proper personal life and as a result tries to have allegiance to her and Joey. That’s usually not going to work well, fence sitting just doesn’t work in this kind of situation.

For the father, he just wants Joey to grow up and be over but otherwise mostly stays out of the situation. He’s written out fairly early as he has to go on a work trip. While that might sound reasonable in most cases, the timing was really bad with how the home situation was. I know he may have lost his job if he stayed home, but that would have been the safer decision.

Then we have the aunt Pen who is a bit more of a fighter. Unfortunately she also has a drinking problem which never turns out well for these characters. She also had a rough start during her first conversation with the family and never really recovered from that. It was nice to have another character at the ready but ultimately she was completely out of her depth.

Finally there is the Nanny. Now the character looks rather suspicious from the start but that’s intentional since you are supposed to choose if you think she is the problem or the kid. Either way she will have the upper hand in all interactions as a grown up. I can’t say that she was a very interesting character though and the backstory wasn’t enough to really move me in the present. The film is really based around the intrigue of the Nanny and so it was always going to be on the back foot there.

The actual flashback of what happened before Joey went away is actually sad so the film was able to land that scene. I do think there would be a lot of questions after such an event and you would have switched the Nanny after that regardless but not everyone’s going to come to the same conclusion. Ultimately this just isn’t a very happy film even if the characters are consistently getting themselves into bad situations. At the end of the day for a film you want to be having a good time and this one felt like it was more on the mean side. There are no real moments for levity or for the characters just having fun. It may not be gruesome in the way a modern horror title would be, but that isn’t enough to take this movie into the green.

Overall, The Nanny is one of those films that just isn’t able to successfully be a high octane thriller. It’s always going to be really hard to do this when one of the main characters is a kid. That just limits the amount of interesting situations you can put the characters in. Additionally the script won’t be as solid as usual since kids are more limited in the words that they know. Unless you think the situation of a nanny possibly being evil is really compelling, I would definitely say to dodge this one.

Overall 4/10