The Babysitter's Seduction (1996 TV Movie)
3/10
"Run, Felicity, Run!'
26 December 2011
Warning: Spoilers
That's what you'll be screaming, albeit in jest, if you stick with this low-intensity mid-90s made-for thriller, which stars the future nighttime soap star as a dimmer-than-a-penlight high school senior seduced by the man whose children she babysits (you might have figured that out from the title). He's no run-of-the-mill sleazebag, though -- he's a sociopath who plugs his wife, stages it as a suicide and then can't quite decide whether he should frame the aspirational lower-middle-class teenager played by sweet Keri or the smug computer hacker (1996 edition), played by stiff John D'Aquino, who was banging his wife. Collins seems to think he's playing against type but his typical narrowed eyes and oily mannerisms render him about as disarming as a used-car salesman turned televangelist. Not that lovely Keri would ever notice, since she's more interested in picking out miniskirts and scoop-neck tops to show off those lovely, barely legal legs and boobs.

Although it's poorly written and acted, "The Babysitter's Seduction" does manage to rise above utter and complete predictability by offering a slight twist on the America's cinematic aupairaphobia. In most domestic thrillers, a hot young babysitter (why aren't men or unattractive women ever hired to tend children?) insinuates herself into a household and whittles away the confidence of the aging (but still beautiful) career woman whose husband and children she gradually lures away. In this movie, at least, Mom is gone within minutes and the babysitter is the one being menaced, although since it's a low-rent ripoff of "The Jagged Edge" you can't credit the filmmakers with great originality. "TBS" also offers a modicum of suspense in that until the end, you never know who's going to save poor little Keri -- her harried single Mom, who's working too hard to save her daughter from the slimy smoothie? Her poorly coiffed ex-boyfriend, whom she blows off so she can attend to Stevie's needs? The tough lady cop, played by Phylicia Rashad, who seems to think that affecting a Clair Huxtable-like knowingness throughout the entire movie will compensate for the inability to keep her mouth shut around the prime suspects in a murder investigation? Or will Keri wise up just in time to save herself? You won't actually know until the last five minutes of the movie, although if Keri Tight And Sheer doesn't keep you interested you may have given up long beforehand.
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