Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead (1991)

The story of a vicious bitter old lady babysitting should not have been cut so short. First of all, the previews in the movie theaters at the time made out most of the preview misleading the audiences to believe that the babysitter would take up a bigger part of the movie. Secondly, they set up several good scenes with the babysitter (Eda Reiss Meringue) (such as her angrily stopping letting the kids watch TV and making them write book reports, for example on the life of the aardvark) and then just dropped them. Third, the writers made the old lady drop dead before the oldest punk rock kid Kenny (Keith Coogan) ever even saw her. I guess that at least set up a rather amusing joke where after she died, Kenny saying "yes, she was a great babysitter". I liked that. Kenny saying that after he first of all, he never saw her, and secondly, she was hardly great. Also sort of amusing was the implication that the old lady seeing Kenny's bedroom is what made her die. A bedroom that was super messy, with heavy metal playing, posters of half naked girls (Samantha Fox (she was a hot late 80s girl)), and with stashes of weed visible. I liked Kenny, but him continuously yelling "rock and roll!" was so cliché, even back then. Christina Applegate I always found super hot, after always watching her on "Married with children". Some of this movie was pretty innocent and feel good, but some of it was dumb too. When the kid's mom goes on a two month summer vacation to Australia and leave the kids with a sadistic old lady, much to Christina's (Sue Ellen, Sue El, Swell; her name shortened) protest, we get a ten minute long tops session of the babysitters scenes before she dies. Then, after a couple more amusing bits of the kids leaving a trunk with her body in it with message "nice old lady inside, died of natural causes" at the funeral home, and then too late realizing that they left the money on the dead babysitters person, they are all stuck and broke with almost two more months before mom comes home. Then the remainder, the main story of the film starts, Swell needing to work to support everyone for the next two months. Kenny was selfish there refusing to find a job too making Swell take on that full role. But I guess Kenny was needed to stay home and watch the little ones, even though he doesn't do a good job of that, getting stoned with his buddies in his room while one of the little ones plays on the roof, falls off and breaks his leg. The main story with Swell working at an office is pretty good but not real good, as of the short section of working at Happy face's (Happy face is the goofy overly eager manager) Clown Dog fast food where she meets Brian (Josh Charles). Her and Brian have a sort of cheesy love story (they hang out at the beach and also (please!) bounce around a department store on big bouncy balls, the type you see 7 year olds on). Brian also thinks his Clown Dog van makes him a hero when he comes to pick up the stranded kids outside of Chucky Cheeses when (chortle), Liza Mineli and Maralyn Monroe (well, thieves in those celebrities' masks) steal the kid's (well, the "borrowed" babysitter's) car. Brian gets suspicious of Swell cause she won't tell him where she works, reason being he's Karen's (Jayne Brook) brother. Karen is the super bitchy receptionist would-be executive assistant at the clothing company that gets her job taken away from Swell. Swell got the high level job through lying big time on her resume. Karen obviously now has a pretty major grudge towards Swell. I sort of understand Karen being sore with Swell since she pushed, as a newbie, ahead of someone who's been with the company for a while and grabbed a high level position away from her who was someone that the executive position was previously promised to. But Karen had already been unnecessarily rude to Swell before that happened when Swell innocently went to the wrong place to apply for a receptionist job. Executive Rose (Joan Cassidy) was initially the one who was gonna promote Karen to be her assistant but desperately didn't want to due to Rose admitting that Karen is usually a very difficult person to get along with. So Karen still needs to take some responsibility for having had such a bad attitude towards people. It's still not right to break a promise to someone you promised a promotion to, but there's no excuse for Karen being such a bitch in general to begin with. I'd say both parties were at some fault here. Another sleazy character was Gus (John Getz), a guy that Rose was involved with but decided to start hitting on Swell behind her back. Gus was sleazy since A), Swell made it clear she wasn't interested in him but he still pursued her anyway, and B), Gus was cheating on Rose. You can see Gus's sleaziness also when he takes Swell to a fancy Beverly Hills restaurant for lunch, buys her martinis (waiter snobbily to Swell: "sweet..or..dry?") and tells Swell in a sultry slobbering way "you will love the chicken here, it's very 'tender'". A couple other things kinda dumb: Swell taking the whole petty cash box home and the younger kids stealing lots of cash from it to buy expensive things like a vast entertainment system. The other dumb thing was Brian sobbing and pleading to take Swell back over the loud speaker of his Clown dog van outside of Swell's house completely oblivious to a big party with lots of people going on. Quite ridiculous don't ya think?

From the being of the movie, I had a hard time of following this movie. But, as the first five minutes went by and we got to the babysitter 's death. Which I thought it was going to be committed by the kids and was thankful that they didn't. I love how shocked the women got freaked out by all the stuff in the house. I love all the typical 90's kid flicks clichés like the tomboy girl refusing to dress more like a girl or the funny little montage. I didn't enjoy the teen-aged brother using drugs and felt the movie should have gotten a PG-13 rating. But,I love how he changed from that to nice,cleaned-up, young man and taking responsibility. Anyways, I thought fashion show was funny for the idea for uniforms even though I can't imagine any school taking them up. But, however, I loved it for how the kids pulled it and grew up. It was nice to see mature teen film that doesn't deal with the search for sex. And the I will leave off on one note about the music, I would have to say the music was decent but, forgettable.

This movie was nothing like what I expected it to be. It looked to me like a movie where the kids get the run of the house and go crazy, throwing parties and doing outrageous, irresponsible things. It ended up being closer to Working Girl: the oldest teen has to get a job and falls backwards into an upwardly mobile fashion career. The responsibilities of maintaining the house eventually turn each of the children into productive citizens.What bothered me wasn't so much the story as the fact that almost nothing was funny. It ended up being closer to a drama. There performances were cartoonish, but at the same time, weren't into so-bad-they're-funny territory (except for the guy who played Gus. Someone should have seen this movie and realized the potential this actor had as a physical comedian).So there was almost nothing to like. Once in a while, we get a good line or two, like when the brother and sister were arguing like a married couple. But as soon as one of these good exchanges got going, the movie cuts right away to something else, killing the comedy momentum. My opinion was that it was an idea with good potential that was completely mishandled.

Rambunctious teenagers, left alone with a cantankerous guardian while Mom is away, must fend for themselves after the old crone croaks (they use the dirty dishes for target practice: "The dishes are done, man!"). Airheads antics for an undiscriminating target audience, although Christina Applegate approaches the limp material with a dry resolve which is admirable and appealing; playing the eldest of the colorful clan, she rises far above the script and general handling. Second-half of the movie takes a sharp turn into big-business waters which, while too klutzy to be called satire, nearly achieves a certain unsteady charm. *1/2 from ****