Film: The Nanny Diaries

The Nanny Diaries is a mainstream film, based on a novel. It stars: Scarlet Johansson (the nanny), Alicia Keys (her friend), Paul Giamatti (her admirer) and Laura Linney (Mrs. X). The 21 year old Annie, Scarlett Johansson, has just graduated from University and has no idea what to do next. Eager to start a new life, she moves to New York City, where she feels like a fish out of water and while sitting in the park, Annie saves a five year old child from being run over and then the boy's mother, an insecure and neurotic woman, Mrs. Alexandra X, Laura Linney, offers her a job as a nanny.

For no obvious reason, Annie takes the job and decides to lie to her mum about it and tells her she is working at a bank. She moves with the X's to become Grayer´s nanny. Life with the apparently privileged X's is not as satisfactory as she thought it would be. Mr X is portrayed as a chauvinistic egoist and Mrs reveals herself to have no interest at all in her own child. She is a neurotic and a control freak. Annie becomes a perfect wallflower and the X´s personal punching bag.

What I really did not understand about the film, or better what really got on my nerves, was the way Annie keeps on suffering the family´s insecurities and becomes a martyr, trapped between dysfunctional parents and a spoilt child. But as I mentioned before, the film is mainstream and surprise, surprise, a rich good looking young man falls in love with her.