REVIEW: Mary Poppins Returns

Directed by Rob Marshall
2018 Family Fantasy
2 hours, 10 minutes
From Disney

Starring
Emily Blunt
Lin-Manual Miranda
Ben Whishaw
Emily Mortimer
Julie Walters
Colin Firth
David Warner
Jeremy Swift
Kobna Holdbrook-Smith
Meryl Streep
Dick Van Dyke
Angela Lansbury
and the children
Pixie Davies
Nathanael Saleh
Joel Dawson


I dare say you have to be one who sees the glass as half empty to not like Mary Poppins Returns... and I mean like it a lot.  Of course I love musicals-- I have that in common with director Rob Marshall-- and I love the joy that overcomes me when I watch them.  The film has a perfect cast, beautiful production values, gorgeous costumes, an exhilarating musical score, songs that induce toe-tapping while others evoke melancholia, and perhaps as much as anything, a soaring tribute to its predecessor.

Most sequels, of course, pale in comparison to originals and the belated sequel (I think 54 years can be considered belated) fares even more poorly. But not this time.  In fact if this one isn't better than the original, it's certainly right up there. 

As in the original, Mary Poppins descends from the skies to bolster the Banks family in its time of need.  In the original, the Banks children were Michael and Jane.  Now they are grownups and the focus is on Michael's three precocious children, twins Anabel and John and adorable little Georgie.  Their mother has recently died and Michael is not coping too well and as a result has fallen behind in his house payments.  The bank is foreclosing but has given Michael a few days to come up with the entire amount that is still owed rather than his three missed payments.  All put their heads together to see to it that that doesn't happen.

That includes Jack, apprentice chimney sweep Bert in the original, who is now a lamplighter.  Though he shares a goodly number of scenes with Mary Poppins and the children, it is Jane who has captured his fancy.  As played by Miranda, Jack has the opening number, Underneath the Lovely London Sky, which establishes the 1930's time period that Londoners referred to as The Great Slump.

Miranda also has the film's big show-stopping number, Trip a Little Light Fantastic, partially performed on bicycles, with Jack's fellow lamplighters.  It looks like Rob Marshall and his choreographers must have been reviewing some of those splashy old MGM musical numbers.  This long number was my favorite.

The Place Where Lost Things Go is a tender ballad originally sung by Mary and later touchingly reprised by the children.  The Royal Doulton Bowl is a fun ditty with a tribute to wordplay and Michael (Ben Whishsaw) talk-sings a heartfelt soliloquy A Conversation, a tribute to his late wife, with tears in his eyes.

Angela Lansbury leads the entire ensemble in the film's park-setting finale in singing Nowhere to Go but Up, a joyous song with everyone holding balloons that lift them into the sky.  Its premise is the promise the film itself offers to all who choose to hear it... that anything's possible. 

The naysayers, you know the ones with their half-empty glasses, will probably carp that the movie has no great songs, certainly not like A Spoonful of Sugar, Feed the Birds and Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious from the original.  But let's be clear... the Marc Shaiman-Scott Wittman songs are total delights and the production numbers in which they're featured are nothing short of movie-musical magic.

And again, the production design by John Myhre and his army of talented workers (I stayed for the 8-hour listing of closing credits--- geez, it reminded me of Star Wars) is simply stunning.  Marshall-favorite cinematographer Dion Beebe aided in the film's dazzling look.

I am not the biggest fan of animated movies but I loved it in this movie.  Marshall apparently fought with the studio who wanted CGI to be used while Marshall wanted hand-drawn animation for the several animated sequences.  He wanted it partially to honor the original film.  I am so glad he won.  It certainly aided in the film's overall classy look.

Sandy Powell and her threading ladies outdid themselves.  I imagine others in the field coming to see her work here and giving a big thumbs up.  Her use of colors is particularly impressive.  She has done costumes for Shakespeare in Love, The Aviator, The Other Boleyn Girl, Young Victoria and this year also worked on The Favourite.  Could she be up for two Oscars?

I am not sure that this Mary Poppins will do for Blunt what the original did for Julie Andrews but the new Mary gives it all she's got.  She is perfect casting to play the starchy nanny with her perfect diction, bossy superiority, no-nonsense manner, ironing board-posture and a warmth underlying it all.  Blunt doesn't have the multi-octave range that Andrews displayed but she does a fine job with the songs.

I have never seen Miranda in anything except an appearance on some TV show.  He sure has the pipes for a movie musical and obviously a Broadway musical.  Acting-wise, it would have been a different movie without him.  Hey Rob Marshall, anything for him in your upcoming live-action, The Little Mermaid?

Whishaw is an actor I've enjoyed for a few years.  I recall seeing him in period stuff but no musicals.  He does a moving job as the grieving husband and handles the musical numbers well.  Mortimer and Walters (as the Banks' housekeeper) are given little to do but having them along is great fun.   Firth is appropriately mean as the bank manager.

Streep makes the most of her song in a flashy scene as some mysterious gypsy-like cousin to Mary.  Lansbury as the balloon lady brought a smile to my face... like seeing an old friend.  It was a hoot watching Van Dyke in his one scene as the owner of the bank (Firth's father), given that he was Bert in the original.  Seeing him  do a little song and dance on top of a desk belies the fact that he turned 93 a couple of days ago.  I also noticed in the end credits that Karen Dotrice is in the film... she played Jane in the original.

Maybe kudos to those three kids... Davies, Saleh and Dawson.  What little troupers they are.  All are a total delight.

This is Rob Marshall and his life partner John DeLuca's baby and she is all grown up now and ready to fly.  They knew the risk in making a sequel to a classic but they thought they were the ones to do it.  They have been involved in any number of ways in the Oscar-winning Chicago, Memoirs of a Geisha, Nine (which I'm nearly alone in loving) and Into the Woods (which I didn't).  Marshall is the best director of musicals that we have today. Even if one doesn't like them so much, they're always visual treats and Marshall has a wonderful way with actors.

There is a lovely nostalgia in abundance here but with a freshness that's also apparent and a charming vitality... all the while staying true to that time-honored Disney formula.

I like something I read that producer DeLuca said about Streep.  I'll never forget Meryl Streep's email after we asked her (to be in the movie):  Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.  This is what we need at this time.  I need to be a part of a project like this that is going to give hope, and as Mary Poppins comes out of that sky, to know that there is, behind those clouds, something that can get us through this.  

She's so right.



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My favorite Christmas movie