Movie Review: Adventures in Babysitting
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What Parents Should Know
Parents need to know that this movie does include some
violent scenes, but they're mostly fodder for jokes that center
on the vivid imaginations of kids from the 'burbs. A "stab
wound" results in just one stitch; criminals chase the kids
through the city, but not for the sinister reason they think.
You'll also find some guns, fistfights, and one scary moment
where a little girl tries to escape a high-rise building by
climbing out a window. The movie is also a little racy, with
talk of
Playboy magazine and a surprising number of sexual
innuendos.
Families can talk about whether Chris made the right decision by taking the children into the city. What could she have done differently when her friend calls her from the bus station? What would have been the sensible, "grown-up" thing to do?
Common Sense Media Review
As perky as its heroine, ADVENTURES IN BABYSITTING is a
madcap dash through the mean streets of Chicago. The movie
manages to remain light-hearted and breezy despite several
potentially dangerous situations that the main characters
face.
Elisabeth Shue plays Chris Parker, a suburban high school senior. When her boyfriend breaks their date one evening, she agrees to a last-minute babysitting gig. Shortly after the parents leave, Chris gets a frantic call from her best friend, who ran away from home and is stuck at the bus station with no money. Soon, Chris and her young charges are piling into her station wagon and heading for the big city.
They quickly find themselves in one scrape after another, starting with a tire blowout that leaves them stranded on a busy freeway. By the time they get the car fixed, they have been held hostage in a chop shop, performed onstage at a blues bar (a fun scene with a cameo from blues legend Albert Collins), been pursued by members of a crime ring, and narrowly escaped a couple of street gangs on a subway. Although they seem to stumble into one mishap after another, Chris and the kids manage to outwit the bad guys -- with a little help along the way.
It's fun to watch Shue, who would later receive an Oscar nomination for her gritty role in Leaving Las Vegas, in this frothy, utterly '80s comedy. The movie also features a number of other actors who went on to bigger and better things, including Penelope Ann Miller, Vincent D'Onofrio, Lolita Davidovitch, The West Wing 's Bradley Whitford, and red-haired Anthony Rapp of the Broadway and screen versions of Rent.
Families who enjoyed this movie might also like Home Alone , Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead or other great Chicago-set movies like Ferris Bueller's Day Off and The Blues Brothers .
Common Sense Media is a nonprofit organization dedicated to providing information to help parents make media and entertainment choices for their families.
