Hey everyone, Capone in Chicago here.

Exposing the true nature of Upper East Side child-rearing practices the same way THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA showed us the inner workings of the fashion-publishing game, THE NANNY DIARIES is proof positive that the only thing keeping these children of filthy rich parents out of hands of Child Services is cold hard cash. In what is by far her most fully realized character since LOST IN TRANSLATION, Scarlett Johansson plays Annie, a girl from Jersey fresh out of business school who decides to take a temporary job as a nanny before she decides to enter the real world. Her diaries take on the form of anthropological observations of parents who treat their children like accessories or a means to hold their crumbling marriages together. The film is a sickeningly display of parenting, but an excellent examination of the lengths these wealthy folks will go to not raise their kids, despite the fact that the mothers often do not work.

While killing time and figuring out her future in Central Park (apparently a popular spot for unemployed nannies to meet rich moms in need of their services), Annie meets young Grayer (Nicholas Art) and his mother, known only as Mrs. X (Laura Linney), who mistakes Annie for a nanny in waiting and immediately asks her to come in for an interview. Within hours Annie becomes a hot property in the wealthy mom circuit, but she ends up with the Xes. It doesn't take her long to realize two things: she doesn't know a thing about childcare, and this is the wrong job in which to find that out.

From this point on, the film becomes a series of Annie's humiliations and dehumanizations, primarily at the hands of Mrs. X, who refers to Annie only as "Nanny" and offers up nothing in the way of positive feedback. Annie tells herself and others (including her best friend played nicely by singer Alicia Keys) that she's enduring the pain and indignity for the sake of Grayer, but that never quite holds water with anyone, including us.

There are quite a few laughs in THE NANNY DIARIES, but I wouldn't quite qualify it as a comedy. There's just a little too much pain for that, and not just Annie's. Mr. and Mrs. X clearly despise each other, despite Mrs. X's attempt to inject some much-needed romance into their relationship. Filmmakers Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini (who also adapted the novel by Emma McLaughlin and Nicola Kraus) know a little something about finding humor in pain since they are the gifted filmmakers who brought us AMERICAN SPLENDOR. They also do something very clever with the character of Mr. X, whose face remains largely unseen by Annie for much of the beginning of the film. He's one of those men who works late; travels constantly; and even when he's home, he pats his son on the head, calls him "sport," and thinks that counts are parenting. I don't think it's any big secret that Paul Giamatti plays Mr. X, but I was blissfully unaware of it until I saw his name in the opening credits. And trust me when I saw, you have never seen Giamatti play a character like this; he's downright ruthless and deplorable, the kind of mind who uses his work as an excuse to hide from his family, then engages in a whole lot of slap and tickle with a young female coworker the first chance he gets. Both Linney and Giamatti are perfection in their roles individually, but put them in a room together and ka-Blam! Let the ugly fireworks commence, in some of the nastiest couple's fighting I've seen since WAR OF THE ROSES.

A few select scenes between Johansson and a handsome young man in the building nicknamed Park Avenue Hottie (Chris Evans) take us away from Annie's torturous life with the X's. As much as we want Annie to save herself, the plain fact is that her interactions with Mr. and Mrs. X are the film's most interesting and uncomfortable. In other words, when she's with the Hottie, I was a little bored since it felt like the filmmakers were attempting to cram a little romance into this story about suffering in paradise.

I did, however, like the interaction between Annie and her nurse mother (Donna Murphy), still home in Jersey. Annie has lied to her mother about her employment and living arrangement, and although the inevitable discovery by mom is a predictable moment in the movie, it didn't play out how I thought it would and I appreciated the effort to try something different and more believable.

I found THE NANNY DIARIES an enjoyable if not particularly challenging work with a lot more going for it than the cutesy commercials and print ads would lead you to believe. Wisely, the film reminds us that it is the child whose future is truly at stake, not Annie. And it is Grayer whose mental well-being that may or may not suffer as a result of his uptight, bickering parents. Annie sees herself as his protector and perhaps the only really positive influence in his life.

The film wraps up a little too neatly for my tastes, but there's a hint by the end that at least one of the boy's parents may be on the road to looking out for him like a loving parent should. The movie is more compelling than I'd anticipated, and although it has flaws, they are forgivable and, in some ways, make the offering a little more interesting.

Capone