The Babysitters

Right now you can watch The Babysitters in the US on Amazon Prime Video and Fawesome — and it holds up to as much attention as you give it. A tight runtime that never overstays its welcome. 548 people have weighed in on TMDB, and the verdict leans heavily positive. Watch it for John Leguizamo — one of the stronger performances out there right now. Available now on Amazon Prime Video — press play and find out why people keep recommending it.

The Babysitters arrived without much fanfare and built its audience the hard way — through word of mouth. The Babysitters trusts its audience to sit with discomfort instead of resolving it too quickly. Seventeen-year-old Shirley is a good student who works as a babysitter in order to make money for college. One night Michael, a father Shirley works for, confesses he's unhappy with married life. Shirley has a crush on Michael, and seizes this moment to kiss him. John Leguizamo and Katherine Waterston lead a cast that treats the material with real seriousness. The Babysitters came out in 2008. The Babysitters resists tidy resolutions in a way that respects how messy real consequences actually are. It delivers reliably on what it promises, which is more than most of its competition manages.

For anyone looking for storytelling that takes its characters seriously, The Babysitters delivers. It has built its own audience without needing a direct comparison. It is a manageable watch, easy to fit into a single evening. John Leguizamo is the centre of it, and it is one of their strongest performances on record. The patience it asks of you early on is paid back with interest.