The Hand that Rocks the Cradle

Check out that beard. Take a look at the bastard. All he needs is the pointy hat.

Trust is her weapon. Innocence is her opportunity. Revenge her only desire. One man's beard their only hope.

A pregnant woman (Annabella Sciorra) is sexually assaulted by her doctor. She files a complaint; he's caught and ends up shooting himself in shame. Doctor Feelgood's blonde wife ( Rebecca De Mornay) is pissed off about losing her ever-loving sleazebag husband, so she seeks out the pregnant woman's family and tricks them into hiring her as their nanny after the child is born. Blaming Sciorra's character for her husband's suicide, she hatches a diabolical plan to sow the seeds of dissent among their nauseatingly perfect family, steal the husband and kids, and bump off the missus as payback.

This film was predictable and boring, with the only mild interest delivered by De Mornay's kind of chilling performance as a psycho nutjob, and pondering what sort of sick mind such a fanciful portrayal of a perfect upper middle-class family could possibly spring from.

The husband speaks in the calm, measured tones of Harley Street psychologist, wears sensible drama-teacher sports-coat-with-patched-elbow clothes and is supposed to be some sort of gifted biochemist. Oh, and he's a huge fan of Gilbert & Sullivan, and the director makes sure we get an extra-large helping of jolly knees-up sing-a-longs all the way through the flick, and just in case we still didn't get he was a fan, there's a few wall-to-floor posters of The Pirates of Penzance and so on liberally scattered through the house (which, naturally, is your standard apartment-block-sized gabled white timber mansions set on the classic tree-lined suburban street that only seem to exist in the movies).

The kid is a work of art: one of those breathtakingly sickening brats with a semi-bowl cut, three teeth missing and always begging mummy if she can please give another quarter to the homeless person. She's so intensely irritating you end up praying the psycho nanny would hit her over the head with a shovel instead of chasing mum all over the house with it to a Benny Hill soundtrack.

Being pregnant, married to a rich scientist that loves The Fine Arts, enjoying a prosperous career of her own, keeping house, feeding the family AND volunteering at the local organic let's-all-pitch-in-together type gardens (which are referred to as “The Botanicals” rightway through the film, as in: “Martha, I'm off to The Botanicals to pick up some seeds) are simply not Wholesome & Good enough for Mrs Perfect. No, she even goes the trouble of hiring some hulking black dude from the Better Days Recovering -Intellectually-Disabled Sheltered Workshop Program to build a front fence for their house because the last one wasn't perfect enough. At the start of the film, Big Spazz makes an attempt to be “special” by slurring a few words, capering oafishly from foot to foot and so on. But the acting strain proved too much so he just settled into the role of gentle downtrodden misunderstood black-guy-sans-Mr-Jinks riding a bike and bonding with tha kidz.

So we have trim, half-a-glass-of-white-is-too-much-for-me mum whipping up some flapjacks for Bowl Head kid, putting out every night for Beard Boy, saving the environment, bringing up two impeccably-behaved Rod & Todd Flanders kids, working a job, building a greenhouse in her back yard by herself presumably to save some endangered exotic species (she can also use power tools) while still finding time to employ the disabled. She's got such a massive social conscience they all probably shit in a bucket and spread it on the seedlings down at The Botanicals.

The interaction between husband and wife is pure gold. “Honey,” he says earnestly.
“Yes, my dearest?”
“Would you mind very much passing the butter? Oh thank you, very sincerely appreciated. Gosh, what say we take some of these delicious scones down to the park to share with some old people and then we can hold hands and sing a few charming verses of The Merry Widow under a tree? Capital! I'll be back from work at exactly 6pm tonight, darling, after my shift at the soup kitchen, so would you mind terribly putting my slippers out? I have a little work to do in my study after dinner.”
“Oh, Richard! May I please set my alarm at 4.30am so I can get up and help you type out your Thesis on your Cure For Cancer? I just feel I'm not doing enough to support you.”

The guy's beard is a work of art. It's perfectly aligned 8mm length growing seamlessly from lower neck, covering his entire jaw, cheeks and up to his hair. He looks like a couple of eyes pasted onto a Persian rug. It's true pedophile material – an absolute work of art. I immediately started calling him Beard, and wander around my house calling "Darling! Do you mind going to shops to buy some crack? My legs appear to be broken."

So anyway, you've got the plot in the first 10 minutes and wait restlessly for it to play out.

Then, in the “climax” part of the movie, the nurse chases Beard into the cellar where he paws weakly at her like a big girl before she whacks him over the head with a spade. Thwack! He tumbles hilariously over the stairs and lands on his fat arse on the floor. Eventually The Golden Woman wanders down and finds him. The next line is glorious, delivered with perfect control and a warm, sincere kindness with a hint of apology.
“Honey,” he murmurs in dulcet tones, dabbing a bead of sweat from his brow with a pressed linen hankerchief. “You see, here's the rub. I'm afraid she's in the house! Ho, ho. You know, I'd go wrestle with her myself, but I rather think both my legs are broken. Dashed things. Call 911, would you, dear?”

No kidding. It's awesome.

The beard, the Bowl Head kid, the Mr Jinks spazzo with the tape measure, and The Botanicals, all add up to give this film one star. The psycho nurse and the fact she flashes her tits a few times gives this movie a further star. But the unbelievable two-dimensional characters and the complete lack of development in any of them throughout the movie plus the boring, obvious plot and annoyingly cheery soundtrack take both those points away. Also, the film doesn't make any sense. Despite Golden Woman's supposedly packed daily schedule, she doesn't actually DO anything more than plant a bit of a seedling and make Bowl Head a fresh-squeezed orange juice. So why does she need a nanny in the first place? Minus one more star. This film is worse than being read a Mills & Boon book by Tony Abbott.

Minus one stars.

-- The Beige Baron