- Directed by Nikyatu Jusu
- Written by Nikyatu Josu
- Stars Anna Diop, Michelle Monaghan, Sinqua Walls
- Run Time: 1 Hour, 39 Minutes
- Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jW-XKkSC63k
Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone
A beautifully filmed story of an African immigrant pursuing the American dream. It’s a precarious situation that she ends up in, working as a nanny, complicated by difficult parents, a child of her own still in Africa, and maybe a ghost or two. The horror is low-key, but it’s pretty good.
Synopsis
Aisha’s Aunt warns her not to lose her new job; “Jobs like this don’t fall from the sky.” Aisha is the new nanny for a family who lives in a high-rise. Amy is the mother, Adam is the father, and Rose is the little girl. Aisha even gets a room of her own for overnights. It’s a very nice place, and it’s clear that Amy is obsessively organized. Aisha later does Facetime with her own son, Lamine, who lives with his aunt in Africa.
Rose is nice, and she and Aisha get along really well. There’s a party tonight as Adam returns home from somewhere, and we see that he’s a bit of a jerk– or maybe not.
That night, she goes to bed and dreams that it’s pouring rain in her room; a regular flood. She wakes up, and realizes it was just a dream. She mentions that Lamine is coming to live with her soon.
Aisha’s friend Sallay says maybe Aisha could apologize to her ex-husband and then ask him for money. Adam invites Aisha to go to dinner with them. Aisha tells Adam that Amy hasn’t been paying her as promised. He promises to talk to Amy about that.
That night, Aisha talks to Malik, the building security guy, about Africa and they seem to be friends. Malik’s son Bishop tells Aisha that his dad has a crush on her.
Aisha talks to Kathleen, Malik’s grandmother, a woman who says she lived all over West Africa for many years. They talk about mermaids and magic. Malik takes her out for soul food and cheesecake. They hit it off and go back to his place for the night.
Aisha meets Cynthia and Florence at the park; they’re nannies too. Several times, Aisha starts daydreaming seeing Lamine in various places. Aisha tells Adam again for not being paid enough, and he offers her “an advance.”
She has a dream about swimming in a pool with a mermaid. Not “The Little Mermaid,” but a big scary one. She passes out in the swimming pool and has to be revived. Kathleen talks about Anansi, the trickster-spider. Later, we see Aisha swallow a live spider in her sleep.
Aisha feeds Rose something from home, and Amy freaks out. Turns out, Aisha has been buying all of Rose’s food, since Amy is too busy (or drunk) to be bothered. Aisha confronts Amy about all her unpaid hours. She has dreams of snakes and suffocation that night.
Rose goes missing that night, and Aisha looks all over for her. Aisha hears “Help me!” and grabs a knife. She cuts herself and then tries to drown herself in the tub. At least some of that was her hallucination. Rose says Lamine made her do it; he’s jealous. Anansi told her all this.
Finally, Aisha has the money she needs to bring Lamine and Mariatou over from Senegal. She waits at the airport– but no Lamine. Aisha finds Mariatou, but Lamine isn’t with her. Mari finally confesses that Lamine drowned at the beach several weeks ago, and she couldn’t bear to tell Aisha over the phone.
Aisha jumps off the pier and once again has to be resuscitated. Then we’re told that she’s pregnant.
Commentary
This is why you shouldn’t hire an immigrant nanny. You never know what kind of crazy you’re going to get. Do these things ever not end up in a horror film?
We kinda figured from all the water imagery that it would turn out that she had drowned her own baby and was delusional about him still being alive. That wasn’t the case here, but some of the weirdness happened even before Lamine died (offscreen), so his ghost or whatever couldn’t have been behind that in the film’s early parts.
The acting and cinematography are excellent– it’s nice to look at the visuals here. There’s not really much of a plot, though. It’s just a few sad weeks in Aisha’s life. The ending was pretty abrupt– she found out that she lost Lamine and then we’re told she and Malik simply had another. Easy come, easy go!
There’s creepy imagery and situations here, but anything horrific is strictly in Aisha’s mind.