That's indeed one rare meat!: Babysitter Wanted (2008)

Babysitter Wanted (2008)
rating: ****
starring:  Tina Houtz, Sarah Thompson, Nana Visitor

How many times had you heard this story? Babysitter's alone with a kid and then gets weird phone calls about some guy breathing over the other end. Surely you would know that the twist in this story is that the loonie on the other line is actually making the call from inside the house, as truck loads of slasher and horror flicks had already utilized this plot such as When a Stranger Calls and its remake.

Babysitter Wanted is one of them, but what sets apart this from the rest of the exploiters is that there's a new and neat twist to the story.

Angie is a girl moving out of her home for college; she's sweet, clean, God-fearing and in need of some money. So when she found a babysitting gig in a nearby secluded farmhouse, she paid a visit to see who will she be up against some time later and by far at this point, the kid turns out to be an adorable tyke in a cowboy costume who only eats a special kind of meat, so Angie thought she can handle it and reassures the boy's parents that everything's gonna be alright.

Boy, was she wrong.

That night, after meeting a cute boy at a local church, things was going as calm as possible until she began to receive some weird phone calls from a guy who's probably a religious nut and an intruder who tries to break in, apparently to murder them all. Doors were broken down, chases are made, weapons are wielded,  just as you think you know where this is going, by the time the cowboy hat fell off from the kid, you'll be damn surprise...

It's hard to do a review of this film without revealing much of the twist (so if you hadn't seen the flick yet, I suggest you stop now and see it for yourself), but all I could say is I might be giving this a good rating cuz of my Catholic upbringing (though, I like to see myself as a religious skeptic nowadays), but you'll have to admit, we hardly see anything like a Pro-Christian slasher flick. Ironically to this claim, though, after the twist is revealed, we get to the real bloody stuff, mostly involving something about rare meat, Bill Moseley playing a good guy, and some really weird killer kid action as the little munchkin devilishly glee at his victim while holding a knife.

Much of the film kinda works as a horror flick, and the twist definitely had it's winning ordeals, whether it may hold to the rest of the movie or not, but what made this film drop down from a possible perfect rating at my case is the ending. It's corny and rushed, they left it wide open for a possible sequel, which as far as I'm concerned, shouldn't be made. (The movie's good as it is. Franchise it and you'll just desperate) Not much on the nudity, and the final girl is too obvious of her survival, but albeit than that Babysitter Wanted is fresh enough for me.

It may not be as shocking as other religious toned slasher flicks out there (End of the Line (2008)), but it's far from being horrible itself (Redeemer: Son of Satan, anyone?); despite the pro-Christian context, Babysitter Wanted is still the everyday slasher you'd seen, with a good twist to boot, even if the impact only lasts for a few minutes.

Bodycount:
1 female hammered on the forehead
1 male throat cut with knife
1 female hammered on the head, butchered
1 male knifed on the chest, shot
1 female shot
1 male knifed on the chest
total: 6