The Sitter
[youtube=http://youtu.be/japyVYImEcM]
You can’t accuse Jonah Hill of not going the extra mile to promote his new movie, The Sitter. When profiled by our own Joel Stein, Hill happily babysat Stein’s son (with hilarious results available to watch here). Thank goodness the movie wasn’t called The Killer.
Instead, Hill plays Noah, who, natch, is the world’s most irresponsible babysitter (he’s a suspended college student). And guess what? He’s only taking three of the world’s worst kids on an overnight adventure through the streets of New York. Ah, Hollywood plots: we shall never tire of you.
But let’s face it: it was high time for a reimagining (of sorts) to 1987’s Adventures in Babysitting, with a nod to Superbad thrown in, wasn’t it? And in the hands of director David Gordon Green, creativity is at least assured. When’s he tried wacky before though, results have been mixed: for every Pineapple Express (good wacky) you get Your Highness (bad wacky).
Critics are no less conflicted. TIME’s Mary Pols acknowledges Hill’s “beautiful timing” but concludes that the movie “falls far short of the joyous insanity of the raunchy/sweet Superbad.” The Las Vegas Weekly is far less kind: “The humor in The Sitter is crude and unoriginal, with an overreliance on racial stereotypes and the concept that small children saying anything remotely vulgar is hilarious.” Gulp. But no matter how the film performs, Hill won’t actually have to take up babysitting to pay the bills just yet.