Stars: 4 out of 5
Pros: Fun and nostalgia filled follow up
Cons: Doesn't fill the huge shoes it has to fill
The Bottom Line:
The magic is back
Many echoes of the first
Still fun on its own
Magical and Fun?
Yes! But Not Practically Perfect
When Disney first announced that they were making a sequel
50 plus years after the release of
Mary
Poppins, I wasn't sure how to take the news.
Mary
Poppins is a true classic with iconic moments and songs that are part of
our national culture.
Obviously, the
cast couldn't come back.
Yet, there was
a part of me that was excited, and that excitement grew as we started seeing
teasers and previews for
Mary Poppins Returns.
This film picks up roughly twenty-five years after the
original. Jane and Michael Banks (Emily
Mortimer and Ben Whishaw) are now grown.
While Jane is living in a flat in London and campaigning for worker's
rights, the recently widowed Michael and his three kids are living in 17 Cherry
Tree Lane. They are struggling in every
way imaginable since Michael's wife died, including financially. Michael took out a loan to help with medical
bills, and he's fallen behind on payments, which has lead the bank to
forclose. He has a week to come up with
the entire loan amount or he will lose the family home.
Into this world returns Mary Poppins (Emily Blunt) on the
end of one particularly familiar kite.
She quickly resumes her position as the nanny to the Banks kids. While the youngest, Georgie (Joel Dawson), is
the first to pick up on her magic, the older two, John (Nathanael Saleh) and
Anabel (Pixie Davies), have become little grownups over the past year in an
effort to help their father deal with his loss and the daily struggle of
running the family home. With the help
of Jack (Lin-Manuel Miranda), a London lamp lighter, Mary and the kids set out
on all kinds of wonderful adventures.
Will it help John and Annabelle regain their childhood? Will Michael figure out a way to save the
house?
I read all of the Mary
Poppins books when I was a kid, and I wish I remembered them better. The first movie took several stories and
strung them together with a plot. I have
a feeling this movie did the same. I
have a vague recollection of stories involving some of the adventures that Mary
and the kids go on here. I know how she
arrives and leaves are directly taken from the books, and I love that. Not that it matters one way or the other, I
just find it interesting.
As much as I enjoyed the movie, lets get my complaint out of
the ways first.
This movie follows the
pattern of the first one almost to a T.
Oh, the particulars are different, but we get similar adventures in a similar
order.
Then again, I have a feeling the
books were like that as well.
(Which is
one reason I suspect they took chapters from later books and used them
here.)
Now, this isn't the first time
that a movie has done something like this.
(
The Force Awakens, I'm
looking directly at you, but many sequels are like this.)
However, this movie just felt rushed to
me.
It was like they knew they had these
tent pole scenes to get to, and they rushed the connecting scenes as a
result.
Unfortunately, it's those
connecting scenes that held the majority of the plot and some of the character
development.
Now, that isn't to say I wasn't having fun. I laughed throughout the movie, and I
definitely felt tears well up a couple of times. (If Michael's song earlier on doesn't get to you,
you have no heart.) There are some very
fun nods to the original that will please any fan of the original. That includes a cameo by original stars Dick
van Dyke and Karen Dotrice. It's easy to
see what scene they had in mind for a cameo by Julie Andrews as well. While the actress they got to play the part is
still a wonderful wink and nod choice (and I'm a fan of the actress, don’t get
me wrong), it made me wish that Julie Andrews had agreed to be part of it.
The songs don't quite live up to the songs from the
original. I have a feeling I will grow
to love some of them over time, and I know I'm not being fair since they had
huge shoes to fill. I will say that I
definitely enjoyed the dancing that went along with the songs.
The cast is all obviously having fun, and that comes through
for us. They were great in their parts
and helped pull me into the story. My
hat is especially off to Emily Blunt who channels enough Julie Andrews to make
it feel like the same character while adding a bit more of the prim and proper attitude
that the character has in the books. I
was especially impressed with her performance.
One thing this movie has over the original is the effects,
but that's hardly a surprise. What was
impressive 50 years ago looks dated today, right? It's hard not to believe everything we see
happening before us on the screen. Who
knows, maybe Mary's magic is real.
And they have a scene with real, hand drawn animation. It's nice to see that art form pop up again
in this age of all computer animation all the time. (I would love to see both regularly.)
While this movie did film outside instead of all in sound
stages like the original, they still capture that look. Visually, even the live action feels like we
are returning to a world we've visited before.
Ultimately,
Mary Poppins Returns captures enough nostalgia to work.
Despite my reservations, I am looking forward
to watching it again.
Stars: 5 out of 5
