Spoonful Of Sugar

So imagine you’re looking for a nanny (they say ‘babysitter’ here, but nanny is what they mean). This person is going to be alone with your child, and what’s more, you child is chronically ill. Do you choose someone who looks a lot younger than she claims to be, presents no documents, acknowledges that she has no experience, says upfront that she doubts your child’s illness is real, and immediately begins treating him in a possessive way? If you do, then what you probably need is Child Services.

Perhaps it’s not surprising that Rebecca (Kat Foster) and Jacob (Myko Olivier) make this mistake, because they’re clearly not that smart to begin with. Their description of the allergies from which young Johnny (Danilo Crovetti) suffers is patently absurd. Nobody can wear nickel jewellery around him? Nickel (oxide) only causes allergy with direct contact over time and, though unpleasant, isn’t actually dangerous. An allergy to synthetic fibres? Then why is the boy in a plastic space helmet? These may sound like trivial things but there are a lot of them, and the cumulative result is to suggest that this film was written without even a basic level of research being carried out first. The result is that, as it deals with themes of distorted perception, we can’t tell what’s supposed to be a product of the characters’ imaginations and what’s simply a consequence of the filmmakers not understanding their subject.

Millicent (Morgan Saylor) exaggerates her youthful looks with pigtails and a Peter Pan collar, whilst the soundtrack includes a song about nursery rhymes seemingly intended to infantilise her further, or to play up an image of whimsical little girl scariness which has been done to death in horror. Masturbation and menstruation are used in a manner both fetishistic and monstering but not, apparently, to any narrative or significant thematic end. For the most part, this material just seems to be present to bolster the running time as the film’s rather slender plot unfolds and then delivers a ‘twist’ which is basically just the addition of another set of narrative clichés. It never misses an opportunity to take the obvious route.

In this chaotic film, a few things stand out as especially daft. “Women aren’t violent,” says a character who’s supposed to be a psychologist – one of several men who have an unhealthy obsession with Millicent, with consequences as predictable as they are twee. Then there’s the fact that she has been prescribed medical LSD and given it in a bottle with a pipette, to take at home with no supervision – not only a ridiculous risk for a pharmacist to take with a controlled substance, but a near guarantee of accidental overdoses. It is also, of course, a convenient excuse for all sorts of narrative untidiness.

One other thing it allows for is an expanded set of stylistic options, and although some directors lose their balance in the absence of constraints, Mercedes Bryce Morgan handles this fairly well. Nick Matthews’ cinematography is the film’s strongest feature, repeatedly pulling it back towards a freshness, a realness which is essential if viewers are to care. Some of the acting works against this, however, and as it tries to pack in more and more, the story becomes increasingly difficult to swallow. To get this one down, you’ll need not so much a spoonful of sugar as a whole bottle of gin.