Adventures in Babysitting

Adventures in Babysitting
by Chris Columbus

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DVD details

Actor: Anthony Rapp, Calvin Levels, Elisabeth Shue, Keith Coogan, Maia Brewton
Director: Chris Columbus
Brand: SHUE,ELISABETH
Cinematographer: Ric Waite
Editor: Fredric Steinkamp
Editor: William Steinkamp
Producer: Debra Hill
Producer: Lynda Obst
Writer: David Simkins
Writer: Elizabeth Faucher
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround; French (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround; English (Subtitled)
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD-Video, Letterboxed, NTSC, Widescreen
Picture Format: Letterbox, 1.85:1
Running Time: 102 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2000-01-18
Audience Rating: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Studio: Buena Vista Pictures

DVD Reviews of Adventures in Babysitting

DVD Review: 2.5 stars out of 4
Summary: 3 Stars

The Bottom Line:

Adventures in Babysitting is the type of movie that 13 year-olds will enjoy, but if you desire something a little bit more than cute adventures after dark you might be better off seeking Martin Scorsese's similarly-themed but far darker and better After Hours.

DVD Review: Adventures in babysittibg movie
Summary: 5 Stars

I am very happy with my product. I love this movie since I was younger and wanted to share it with my daughter, I could not find it anywhere till I looked on amazon.com. I am very glad I could share this with my daughter thank you very much

DVD Review: Always carry a spare tire!
Summary: 4 Stars

Chris (Elizabeth Shue) has a hot date with her boyfriend Mike and is dancing away to `And Then He Kissed Me' when Mike rings the doorbell. To her surprised, he cancels the date so he can stay home with his sick sister since his parents are not home. Of course Chris is upset, but there is always next week. After a little sulking with her friend Brenda, she gets a call to hopefully have her babysit someone she knows, Sara Anderson. Sara's brother, Brad, has a huge crush on her even though he's a couple years younger. So instead of going to his friend's house like planned he decides to stay over. This of course leads to the friend, Daryl, to come over also. And of course he's `that friend' that makes you just *sigh* cause of the some of the things he says or does.

Right after the parents leave, Chris gets a call from her friend Brenda pleading for her to come rescue her from the bus station, which apparently must be in hell due to the very strange people there. Chris decides to help her out and has to bring the kids along due to them ratting her out if she doesn't. And that is when the title of the movie begins to go into play. It all starts with one flat tire and a man with a hook.

I'll tell ya what, this movie is still pretty funny and still fun to watch after almost 22 years. It is still a charmingly fun movie, and a lot of fun to watch. I honestly thought after having not seen it for quite some time, that maybe it wasn't going to be as a good as I remembered. Wrong. It really was a lot of fun. Sure some parts weren't as great or funny as I remember, but they were still good and kind of funny or silly. Like the blues singing scene. I remember that being really cool when I first saw it (loooong time ago), but this time it was still funny and good, but just not all that like last time. I loved the beginning where Brad is all excited about Chris being at the house and then his mom or his sister totally embarrassing him by saying `Stop fawning over her' or `don't eat chocolate cause it doesn't help your acne'. Seriously my mom did that to me once in front of a girl I had a huge crush on and I felt that guys pain right on the spot...haha. And all the 80's stuff that's just genuine 80's stuff was so cool to see again. Like an older Burger King logo and Sara's backpack. Her backpack had Gizmo on it. Seriously... I want that backpack! And holy cow, the two gangs in the train were hilarious! It was like a bad `Beat It' video. Seriously Michael Jackson could have just popped out right there and started singing. They also reminded me of the `hot cops' from Arrested Development. Remember the episode where George Michael Jr. buys weed for his uncle? Hilarious.

In the end, great movie. If you love some 80's movies, then you'll want to own this. I guess I can only think of one bad thing and that's for the parents trying to show their kids some of the `older' movies from the 80s and that is that this movie does have a little bit of cussing. I believed they used the `f' bomb twice.

P.S. - A guy that looks like Thor in this movie is played by Vincent D'Onofrio. It was pretty funny to see him in pretty good shape considering what he usually looks like in his roles.

DVD Review: Family Favorite
Summary: 5 Stars

"Adventures in Babysitting" has been a family favorite for 20 years. I purchased the movie for our family to enjoy again during a recent family gathering. As expected, the movie did not disappoint. All of the characters were true to our recollection, and the humor as fresh as the day we first enjoyed the movie. It's highly recommended.

DVD Review: An unexpected adventure...
Summary: 4 Stars

I firmly believe that Elisabeth Shue needs more work. I mean, really; this girl should have a huge career right now and yet I find that half the known world doesn't even know who she is. Her film choices scatter from inspiring to forgettable to just plain bad and I wonder just what she has to do to recapture the brilliance she showed us in 1995 when she nabbed an Oscar nomination for her staggering portrayal of a kind hearted streetwalker in `Leaving Las Vegas'. Well, for those of us who love Shue, this little 80's classic is a surefire hit you will want to watch again and again.

Cute, funny and sweet, `Adventures in Babysitting' is not mature fare, but it is nothing short of entertaining.

Shue plays Chris Parker, a teenage girl smitten with her rocking boyfriend Mike. She's more than ready for her big date (and that big kiss) when Mike blows her off last minute with some lame excuse (yeah, I said lame). With nothing to do she accepts a job babysitting the Anderson kids for the night. Young Sara is obsessed with Thor and Brad is, well, he's obsessed with Chris. When Chris's best friend Brenda calls up in desperate need of some help Chris finds herself packing the kids (as well as Brad's friend Daryl) into her station wagon and venturing deep into the heart of Chicago.

Like I said, the film isn't that smart, but it sure is a lot of fun.

There are some truly funny and memorable sequences; from a brawl on the subway to being carjacked and even an improv sing-song; that will have you laughing and keep you interested.

Elizabeth Shue has this genuine charm that reeks here, and even in her meatier and less `fluffy' films she still manages to draw us in with the purity of her spirit. Here she has that in spades, and that is one reason why this movie works despite its flaws. Both of the Anderson kids, played by Maia Brewton and Keith Coogan, are well represented; and the script nicely plays the budding (or is it) romance between Coogan and Shue. There is nothing overly schmaltzy or saccharine about this movie. It all has a very nonchalant character to it. It never takes itself too seriously and so it never tries to hard to convert us or move us, and that plays to its benefit.

With nice little turns from a very young Vincent D'Onofrio and a very funny Penelope Ann Miller ("Chris I'm begging you, it's really scary here. I've just seen three people shoot up, a bald Chinese lady with no pants on, and there's this old guy outside who wants his bedroom slippers!"), this is a film that will make you laugh, make you smile and make you just plain happy you have a working DVD player.

Description of Adventures in Babysitting

Chris Parker (Elisabeth Shue) agrees to babysit after her "dream" date stands her up. Expecting a dull evening, Chris settles down with three kids for a night of TV ... and boredom. But when her frantic friend Brenda calls and pleads to be rescued from the bus station in downtown Chicago, the evening soon explodes into an endless whirl of hair-raising adventures! Babysitter and kids leave their safe suburban surroundings and head for the heart of the big city, never imagining how terrifyingly funny their expedition will become.

Way before she grabbed an Oscar nomination for her searing performance as a world-weary prostitute in Leaving Las Vegas, Elisabeth Shue was known as one of the squeaky-clean actresses of the '80s. Having made a splash in The Karate Kid and the '60s-nostalgia TV series Call to Glory, Shue cemented her good-girl reputation with the charming but badly titled Adventures in Babysitting. Set in the John Hughes-style suburbs of Chicago, the titular adventures follow babysitter Chris (Shue), who agrees to watch the Anderson kids (Keith Coogan and Maia Brewton) when her boyfriend cancels their anniversary date. All is quiet on the home front until Chris is called upon to rescue her best friend (Penelope Ann Miller, also doing good-girl duty) from the seedy downtown bus station. She can't leave the kids, and she can't leave her friend alone in the big bad city, so she packs everyone in the station wagon and heads into Chicago. Screwball craziness begins as they encounter car thieves, knife-wielding gangs, gun-toting truck drivers, and, worst of all, Chris's duplicitous boyfriend. It's hardly mature entertainment, but Shue makes it work; when she wins over the audience at a blues club with her improv singing, you'll be won over, too. In his directorial debut, Chris Columbus (who later went on to helm the sap-fests Mrs. Doubtfire and Home Alone) gently skewers the suburbia white-bread mindset of the main characters, and plays up the comedy over the schmaltz with a subtlety of which he now seems incapable; the near romance between Shue and Coogan is played lightly and adorably. Look for brief appearances by art-house faves Lolita Davidovich as a college party girl and Vincent D'Onofrio as an unlikely savior. --Mark Englehart

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