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Nanny Movie Review

Nanny is a 2022 horror film directed by Nikyatu Jusu and starring Anna Diop. It’s a frustratingly ineffective movie that is more of a drama than a real horror.

An African woman hopes her new job as a nanny will help bring her young son to the United States. However, when a violent presence begins to invade both her dreams and reality, it threatens to destroy everything she’s fought for. This is one of those auteur horror movies that receive great attention at festivals, this one at Sundance, but aren’t really audience-friendly. I certainly found it boring and ineffective within the horror genre.

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It’s all too psychological without ever being really creepy. There is a lot of underwater imagery here that is filmed beautifully and it is eerie enough, but ultimately this imagery felt too ambiguous and it didn’t lead to anywhere meaningful. Clearly, there is a lot going on here thematically speaking, from the theme of immigration to the concept of the American Dream, but I would hardly classify these themes prone for the genre treatment.

The result is a movie that is basically drama masqueraded as a horror film. But it’s not really strong as a drama due to those themes failing to get proper exploration. The entire film’s executed in such an ambiguous, vague manner that it felt very disappointing in not giving audiences a meatier narrative.

Anna Diop is wonderful in the main role and she got a strong arc overall, but the problem here lies in other characters, all of which are underdeveloped. The girl is cute, but that’s pretty much it. As for the mother, she is overly cold and unlikable to the point that she didn’t feel realistic. Others failed to make any impression. Nanny is very well acted, shot and directed, but it lacked a clear narrative goal or punch, leading to a misguided attempt at elevated horror.

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