Another
movie I was gladly able to make time for within my Oscar-film schedule (this
one did get a nomination – Best Original Song – but it wasn’t on the list for
any of my main categories.) While I
recognize the critiques that many have of it, I personally found it to be both
enjoyable and charming.
Over the
years, the Banks children have grown up.
Michael has been struggling to keep the house running smoothly since the
death of his wife, and the financial hardships of the Great Depression make it
that much more difficult. Despite the
help he gets from Jane (now a labor organizer) and his three precocious
children, what the situation really
calls for is Mary Poppins. She flies
back into the Bankses’ lives right when they need her most, looking after the
children but really helping the whole family.
The movie
takes a page out of The Force Awakens’s
book, creating a new story with some new characters but leaning heavily on the
nostalgia from its predecessor. It can
easily be argued that most of the movie just riffs on variations of set pieces
from the original, and since this is a sequel rather than a reboot, it does
have a “cribbing from the glory days” feel to it. An animated stroll through a china bowl
instead of a sidewalk painting, a big dance number with lamplighters instead of
chimney sweeps, and so forth. It can
give the film a rehashed feel, which takes away from its anything-is-possible
air.
And so,
the film often works best for me when it’s focusing on what makes it different
from the original. Michael’s children
have their own dynamic with Mary Poppins and with Michael. Their mother’s death has affected the whole
family deeply. The two older children
have grown up quickly and take it upon themselves to look after the household
(so they’re not in need of a nanny, thank you very much,) while the youngest is
the most willing to believe in Mary Poppins and her magic. I like the way the effects of grief are woven
into the story – in particular, Mary Poppins sings a beautiful lullaby about it
called “The Place Where Lost Things Go” (the one that got the Oscar nod, by the
way) that comes back in a lovely way later in the film. I also enjoy seeing how Jane and Michael have
rationalized their own childhood experiences with Mary Poppins, chalking it up
to games and wild imaginations (how quickly we forget.)
The score
is by Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman, of Hairspray
and Smash, and I find it nice but a
little forgettable. While all the songs
are enjoyable and have some good lyrics, there aren’t really any immediate
standouts. Also, at some point, I’d got
it into my head that I’d heard Lin-Manuel Miranda was writing the score, and so
1) I spent quite a bit of time trying to imagine what Miranda-penned Mary Poppins songs would be like and 2)
I couldn’t help feeling a bit disappointed when I learned that it was actually
Shaiman and Wittman, even though I’ve always liked their work
The cast
was my biggest inducement to see the film, and they’re predictably
fabulous. As Mary Poppins, Emily Blunt
is prim and just a little frosty but simultaneously warm and magical – i.e.,
everything she should be. Miranda is fun
and personable as Mary Poppins’s working-class sidekick Jack (his Cockney
accent, while not as tragic as Dick Van Dyke’s in the original, definitely
continues that tradition of dubiousness.0
Ben Whishaw (an amazing Richard II) and Emilly Mortimer (who I’ll always
remember as Nina in Bright Young Things)
do lovely work as Michael and Jane, and I was pretty impressed with the young
actors playing Michael’s kids. The film
also features Colin Firth and Meryl Streep, plus a terrific cameo from Van
Dyke.
Warnings
Thematic
elements, scary moments, and a few mildly-suggestive lyrics.
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