Mary Poppins Returns a mixed carpet bag of magic, misses
By Michael Phillips, of the Chicago Tribune.
Families could do a lot worse this holiday season than to take out a home equity loan for a bucket of multiplex popcorn and take in Mary Poppins Returns, director Rob Marshalls hectic sequel to the 1964 Disney musical cherished by millions.
Those who dont want their memories of the original messed with unduly can take comfort in how the sequels storyline follows the narrative and musical beats of the original, right down to a radically square 2-D animation sequence. And its hard to imagine either slaves to the 64 musical or newcomers of any age having a problem with Emily Blunt.
Her incarnation of the magical, gently fearsome nanny created by author P.L.Travers (who hated Disneys version) suggests a hint of the paradoxical imperious sparkle Julie Andrews brought to Mary Poppins. Then Blunt adds streaks of witty, sly playfulness that are more her thing. And it all works.
The costumes do a lot for Blunts characterization. Mary Poppins Returns takes place 24 years after Mary Poppins, in 1934. The effects of the global economic downturn feed into screenwriter David Magees misery-adjacent storyline concerning the grown-up Banks children. Grieving widower Michael (Ben Whishaw, quite moving) is raising young John (Nathanael Saleh), Annabel (Pixie Davies) and Georgie (Joel Dawson), while the childrens aunt, Jane (Emily Mortimer), pays homage to her late mothers interest in the suffrage movement with her own organized labor efforts.
The plot deals with a threatened foreclosure on the Banks family home at 17 Cherry Tree Lane, London, and greedy capitalist pigs personified by the steely two-faced banker played by Colin Firth. But then theres Mary, who arrives via kite this time, and swans around in fabulously smart 30s hats and delightful footwear. All hail costume designer Sandy Powell. Her work for all the characters here evokes 34, the 64 Disney film and fantasy realms that know no boundaries.
Lin-Manuel Miranda, that Hamilton chap, takes second billing as Jack the lamplighter, who were told was once apprentice to chimney sweep Bert. Youll recall Dick Van Dyke in that role back in 64. In Mary Poppins Returns Van Dyke, now 92, more or less reprises the cameo he played in the first Disney Poppins film. Its a serious treat to see Van Dyke jump up on a table and soft-shoe a few bars, as the son of the ancient banker, Dawes.
The other major nostalgia bonus is Angela Lansbury, 93, who pops up in the final scene as the Balloon Lady. Songwriters Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman (Hairspray, one of the sturdiest Broadway scores of the century) reward her with the swell waltz Nowhere to Go But Up, which echoes the originals Lets Go Fly a Kite for a sunny, open-air finale.
Alas, thats the only song from Mary Poppins Returns I can recall, several days after seeing it. Thats a significant drawback in a well-cast but rather strenuously jolly holiday of a sequel. The nine songs run the gamut from male-chorus spectaculars (Trip a Little Light Fantastic) to eccentric comic turns (Turning Turtle, an upside-down discombobulator sung by Meryl Streep as Marys Aunt Topsy) to a music hall song-and-dance duet for Blunt and Miranda (The Cover is Not the Book, more frantic than clever, though its fun to hear Miranda bust a few lines Hamilton style).
Director Marshall stages things with workmanlike efficiency. The movie piles on, the barrage of effects and diversions largely dictated by the demands of the animation interludes and the surfeit of routine digital effects. The 2-D vignette, in which Mary, Jack and the kids pop into a porcelain bowl illustration for a mad chase sequence, almost works, but it too sweats and strains for the magic. Of his six features to date, four of Marshalls films have been musicals: Chicago (2002), Nine (2009), Into the Woods (2014) and Mary Poppins Returns. Hes devoted to the form, though his two non-musicals, Memoirs of a Geisha (2005) and the eternity that was Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (2011), point to a clunkiness never entirely absent in this uneven picture. The original Mary Poppins was exuberant, fueled by terrific Sherman brothers songs. Mary Poppins Returns is often just pushy. So Im mixed on it. You can enjoy various bits and pieces of Mary Poppins Returns, and a lot of the performers, even as you roll your eyes at, for example, the anachronistic BMX parkour stunt biker interlude. Im no purist, but really. The first Mary Poppins managed perfectly well without consulting the latest fads and spicing up Step in Time with a bunch of hula hoops.
MARY POPPINS RETURNS 2.5 stars out of four Rating: PG, for some mild thematic elements and brief action Cast: Emily Blunt, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Ben Whishaw, Emily Mortimer, Nathanael Saleh, Pixie Davies, Joel Dawson, Meryl Streep, Angela Lansbury and Dick Van Dyke Director: Rob Marshall Running time: 2 hours, 11 minutes Now playing: In area theaters