Have you ever watched a film and thought, “This is such a Lifetime movie”. I get the vibe a few times a year checking out indie films that somehow squeak by festival committees and make their dull way onto arthouse cinema screens. But, it’s a rare occasion that a genre film makes me feel like I just got a shot and half of estrogen pumped into me via television osmosis. The last time I can remember it happening was when I checked out the Julie Delpy snore-fest THE LEGEND OF LUCY KEYES. That film wasn’t an actual Lifetime Movie. It just felt all melodramatic like one of those films probably would. In reality, I don’t really know what a Lifetime movie looks like. And since I don’t really watch “Women’s Television”, it would be a real shock for me to actually say that I just watched a Lifetime Movie, let alone a Lifetime Horror Movie. Until today, or rather, last night.

THE SITTER is sort of a HAND THAT ROCKS THE CRADLE, women watch out who you let into your home, around your kids, and near your husband kind of fairy tale. The type of film that had it’s heyday in the 1970’s and 1980’s but fell on harder times when the cynical cinema of the 1990’s started blazing through the clichés of those eras. In reality, those films worked because they were so predictable that you knew every twist and turn before the first frame flickered across the screen. But the truth is that’s what killed those films and films like SINGLE WHITE FEMALE and THE STEPFATHER too. So, would a new take on a tired genre cliché work in a tech savvy world where paranoid working moms install stuffed animals with lipstick cameras to catch deranged nannies pummeling their kids, seducing their husbands and slaughtering their neighbors? Probably not. That’s why this film feels like it was made 20-years ago.

It helps the validity of that last statement greatly that the filmmakers behind THE SITTER cast Mariana Klaveno in the titular role. Klaveno looks like a cross between Alexandra Paul and Catherine Mary Stewart. If she had arrived on the job with a poodle-do and wearing a blue button-down oxford shirt, I probably would have double checked the copyright date on the production. As THE SITTER, Klaveno does a surprisingly effective job. First off, she’s young and innocent enough that the kids just fall in love with her. Second, she’s young and seductive enough that the dad just goes completely nuts for her too. In fact, she’s so hot that the neighborhood men are all drooling when she makes her grand appearance at the party. Considering the threat that she must cast over suburbia, it’s no wonder that all the women in the film—except the clueless family matriarch (Gail O’Grady)—are desperate to dig up some dirt on the girl. Oh…and there is dirt to be had. After all, THE SITTER is a sociopathic, homicidal maniac.

It’s hard to fault a film that delivers everything it promises, if you know what it promises going in. So, THE SITTER stands its ground with fine performances, predictable plot devices, television quality kills and no nudity. It’s more or less everything that you’d anticipate it’s going to be, if I told you the film debuted in September 2007 on The Lifetime Network. It’s never going to be a 5-star film, but lined up with its 1980’s predecessors, it’s a fine, entertaining suspense film.

So, what’s the problem with THE SITTER. Simple, this production is being marketed as a horror film. An unrated DVD edition—which by now should be so passé that only the most naïve genre fan would think that means anything. And, as a horror film the film is neither horrifying nor is it satisfying. It’s just plain dull. Which is a shame, because if the distributor had simply told us straight up that THE SITTER was what it was, it probably would not wind up so disappointing to so many unsuspecting horror fans.

Ultimately, if you’re looking for a little nostalgic fun that’s light on the bloodshed and heavy on the conventions then THE SITTER is a fun little trip back in time. If you need a visceral thrill ride of psychotic slaughter then you’ll do yourself a huge favor and run away from this film fast. I’m on the fence—as my rating attests. I think the final project delivered exactly what the writer and director intended it to deliver for exactly whom they intended to watch it. Tragically, for you and me, the marketing department seems to have a much different—and much more incorrect—idea of this films audience.