Nanny Express [DVD] [2009] [Region 1] [US Import] [NTSC]

I watched this on Hallmark Channel and fell in love with the story.

Where a young woman is working her way through school to be a teacher while volunteering to tutor at her church. Her father is very ill she lives with him, they have a great father daughter relationship. After she loses one of her jobs she finds a nanny position with a family where the kids need loads of TLC...

Great story...the father of the Nanny makes it a point to always tell his daughter that he "Loves her as big as the sky"...

This is the type of quality I've come to associate with the Hallmark name over the years.

The movie opens with a series of unfortunate events experienced by the 20+ nannies who have tried to cope with the 2 children of David Chandler. Meanwhile, Kate is coping with a father with heart disease, being laid off from her job, working on getting her teaching degree and tutoring kids from low-income families at her church. The driver of the bus on her regular route (and soon-to-be her best friend's boyfriend) connects her with a job because his sister runs a business providing housekeepers and nannies. That is how the Chandlers meet Kate.

She has the same pranks pulled on her that 9-year-old Ben and 15-year-old Emily played on all of their other victims, but she needs the job, so she sticks with it. She also sees in Emily the shadows of her own past and hopes that she will be able to help her. Ben begins to thaw toward her, but Emily remains cold and disdainful. This is the hardest part of this movie for me. The father seems completely clueless as to how to teach his daughter to show respect to others. She continually treats the nanny in demeaning ways and the father witnesses it and does little or nothing, other than apologize to Kate for her behavior. It is as if the death of her mother three years ago excuses her from accountability for her actions.

David Chandler is so grateful that Kate has stayed that when he finds himself attracted to her he hesitates to show it
for fear that things might not work out between them and then he will have lost the only nanny that stayed more than a day. Kate is attracted to him, but isn't sure of his feelings at first.

Emily is aware of what is happening between her father and Kate and she does her best to sabatoge the relationship. It appears that she is successful.

**Spoiler Alert**
A turn of events in Kate's life causes her to quit her nanny job, but she returns to the Chandler home (I don't think I mentioned that Kate describes their home as being bigger than the whole apartment complex in which she lives) to give Emily a present on her 16th birthday. Emily is anything but grateful and doesn't bother opening it.

In Kate's mind her association with the Chandler family is over and she is trying to move on with her life, but then Emily finally opens her gift and the surprising content causes a change of heart. She confesses her meddling to her father and the family sets out to get Kate back.

I always struggle with bratty kids in movies--luckily these do change. Kate is such a sweet, patient person and maybe a little "too-good-to-be-true," but she is sustained by her faith and that is a positive message that we could use more of these days. If you can overlook Emily's attitude problem and the fact that she gets a brand new luxury car for her 16th birthday, it is a fun chick-flick.

I usually avoid these family kind of movies. They tend to be corny, mushy, over done with syrupy music playing from start to finish. This one is a refreshing surprise!

My wife and I decided to sit this one through, and yes, of course, you pretty much know what's going to happen from start to finish. A young teacher to be takes a nanny position from a rich, handsome guy(Can there be any other type?)widower who has two bratty children. This is lighthearted fair, but with a couple dramatic elements, basically dealing with the death of one's parents. Also, I wouldn't call it a true romantic comedy because the protaganist don't spend the first half of the movie hating/fighting with one another; nonetheless, a potential romance ensues.

Two of my favorite, stalwart actors perform well in their small but important roles: Dean Stockwell as the nanny's 'hanging-on-to-his-last-gasp', loving father and Stacy Keach as the tad potbellied, sympathetic, wise minister. I love these guys, they act without acting!

Produced by Faith and Family Entertainment, they live up to their name. It's clean, and the story gently stresses faith in God, seeing things through, and love.

My one complaint, they do play the music non-stop through the movie, but thankfully, it's not has syrupy as most. You know, it's difficult to make a fully balanced movie, and I think more so with family fare, and have all the elements work well.

If you need a bit more meat, bite or uncertainty in a flick, you're not going to like this one, but for us and for this type of genre, we found it satisfying. Also, there's no nasty people or words, enjoy a few smiles and tears.