Shari Springer Berman and Robert
Pulcini’s The Nanny Diaries is a charming and engrossing
movie at heart, but ultimately comes across as a muddled effort
because the directors never settle on a singular tone for their
film. Scarlett Johansson plays protagonist Annie Braddock, a
recent NYU graduate who enters the cutthroat Manhattan
job-market feeling totally intimidated. After a failed interview
for a position at a sky-scraper-housed corporation, Annie finds
herself sitting in Central Park, contemplating future
opportunities. At this moment, by utter chance, she saves
five-year old Grayer (Nicholas Reese Art) from being run over by
none other than a man on a motorized vehicle. Thankful for her
son’s safety after a sticky situation, Grayer’s mother (Laura
Linney), a cold Upper-East-side housewife simply referred to as
“Mrs. X”, mistakes Annie for a nanny and instantly offers Annie
the career of taking care of Grayer full-time. Annie,
wanting to find a job that will allow her to decompress, accepts
Mrs. X’s proposition, contrary to her mom’s lectures about how
she should try to find a profitable job in the field of
business. What follows is Annie’s narrated expose on the broken,
cold spirit of Grayer’s ridiculously wealthy family.
The Nanny
Diaries’ constant tonal changes make the picture feel as
though it’s trying to be five different movies in one. It opens
as a light-hearted drama about Annie finding her identity in the
world. When she takes the job as Graer’s nanny, the tone
instantly shifts to that of a melodramatic family film,
relentlessly trying to get the audience to sympathize for the
love-deprived kid. All the while, a bloated chick-flick is
developing as Annie enters a relationship with the Xs upstairs
neighbor (Chris Evans). Throw in the occasional spot of the
comedy genre, and The Nanny Diaries forms a complete
product. No—wait—that would ignore the serious drama that the
film takes on in its third act as it chronicles the marital
problems between Graer’s parents.
Despite its
aforementioned and quite troubling array of tones, The Nanny
Diaries still manages to capture the viewer’s interest for
the bulk of its duration. In fact, if I were to evaluate each of
the movie’s tonal sections separately, I would likely praise the
majority of them. Accordingly, the whole of The Nanny Diaries
proves engaging in spurts. The main reason for this is that the
performances are uniformly excellent. As Annie, Johansson is as
reliable as ever, imbuing a realistic and sympathetic spunk into
her role. Nicholas Art proves himself to be a worthy child-actor
as Graer. Playing Graer’s parents, Paul Giamatti and Laura
Linney capture an intense coldness that feels authentic to their
emotionally-confused but socially-prominent characters. Rounding
out the featured cast, Chris Evans turns in a pleasant
performance as Annie’s love-interest.
In the end,
The Nanny Diaries may not feel like a cohesive piece of
cinema, but it’s engaging enough to make for an entertaining
watch. When it is released on DVD, the film will prove an
excellent rainy-day entertainment.