Re: Mary Poppins Returns
Posted: Mon Mar 18, 2019 3:26 am
I watched this at home, and it is still just the most magical film. I absolutely love it; it holds up on TV beautifully as well.
Sotiris wrote:LMM nominated for his acting? In this movie? Seriously?disneyprincess11 wrote: Best actor in a motion picture, comedy or musical
Christian Bale, “Vice”
Lin-Manuel Miranda, “Mary Poppins Returns”
Viggo Mortensen, “Green Book”
Robert Redford, “The Old Man and the Gun”
John C. Reilly, “Stan and Ollie”Do voters just see his name and vote for him for anything?
I don't know, I preferred the Frozen soundtrack to this, overall. But, leaving Frozen, I'd have to go back to Tarzan to find another one as good, from Disney--I'm not including the B&tB and Aladdin re-makes, because that's a cheat.Musical Master wrote: In fact, to me this is the most memorable set of songs we ever had for a Disney film since The Hunchback of Notre Dame.
Yes, it’s a shame he didn’t have more of a motive, although I guess greed is enough. I thought Colin Firth did the best he could with the character, even though there wasn’t much going on. I did laugh seeing Spratt from Downton as one of the bank characters. He really fit the role.Musical Master wrote:
Of course I wonder why Wilkins wants to repossess the Banks house in the first place because I heard from one Instagram review that he didn't have a clear motivation for it.
I thought for sure that line was Emily Blunt speaking to the children, but it was Meryl Streep! She sounds so different on that line from the rest of the song.UmbrellaFish wrote: Second question: during Turning Turtle— there is a line “Perhaps if you all lend a hand” which sounds a bit like Angela Lansbury to me, but it could be Meryl and I don’t recognize it because of the character voice. But it really sounds like Lansbury to me. Am I right?
That’s a good point. For instance, when the children decide to go to Wilkins’ office and the camera is on Blunt's face as if she’s deciding to let it play out. I guess I’ve always thought of MP in the original as sort of an angel in the guise of a human, the same way I do Cinderella’s Fairy Godmother or B&tB’s Enchantress. This doesn't make me think of her differently, since she still does have many moments where she knows what's coming before everyone else (like the door that would open being when she leaves), just I wish they'd kept her more ahead of everyone.UmbrellaFish wrote:Sometimes you can see the gears turning in this Mary’s Head, too, as though she is forming her schemes as she goes along which is a new development. Walt’s Mary seemed to be perpetually 10 steps ahead of everyone else, all the time. This change makes her seem more human and a little less omnipotent.
JTurner wrote: Too bad it's going to do nothing to renew interest in 2D animation.
This is definitely my favorite of the covers. I love the way they included the artwork in this picture. Was this the poster when it was in theaters, too?Sotiris wrote:The movie is coming to home video on March 26th, 2019.
4K Ultra HD
http://i.imgur.com/9mLvaLPl.jpg
I so agree! “Feed the Birds (Tuppence a Bag)” represents a critical theme of Mary Poppins, to have mercy on / do charity for others. I did like at least that Jane mentioned that her organization runs soup kitchens in her scene with the bankers at the beginning, and how the kind banker is noted for his contrast to the others who only care about money. Oh, and I remember posting in the Mary Poppins thread years ago, about how I didn't like the implication at the end of the first film that Mrs. Banks' feminism was as detrimental to the family as Mr. Banks' greed, or at least as something superfluous that needed to be set aside for the good of the family. In a way, they fixed it here because Jane is also a feminist, one who does work for the needy as well, meaning Mrs. Banks continued to fight for women's rights even after the end of the movie. I wanted to say that somewhere in my post before I forgot!Dr Frankenollie wrote:I thought I’d like it. I do love the original. But it was quite a disappointment. For a film which is – supposedly – put together by lovers of the 1964 original, it is deeply thematically out of step with it. This is a film made by someone who evidently regards the cartoon penguins as more integral to the first feature than Feed the Birds or the character arc of George Banks.
I agree that the moment he shouts at them comes across forced. For one, the action is clearly not a normal occurrence, merely frustration at his current predicament, whereas George Banks was patronizing and deluded as a way of life. That said, I don't fault the film for the fact that Michael has less room to grow than George Banks. I think the purpose of Mary Poppins being there this time around was to bring hope back to the family that was lost with the death of Michael's wife, more than re-align them--or solely Mr. Banks, rather--entirely the way she did in the first film. Then again, I suppose in some ways, you could say Michael was focusing on money too much, too, albeit in a different way. Whereas Mr. Banks practically worshiped money and the bank, and wanted his son to do the same, Michael was merely focused on saving the house. Still, the fact that the shares ended up being on the kite (because MP purposely put it in the youngest kid's hands) means that perhaps the point was that Michael should've still been focusing on his family despite what temporary crises were happening in his life. You can't control the world or what happens to you, but you can control how you use your time. If he had been giving more attention to his children, making time to have fun with them (a la "Let's Go Fly a Kite"), he would've found the shares immediately. For me, that has more of a religious meaning (and I'm trying not to be too explicit here because I know not everyone believes the same things), that you have to trust that things will take care of themselves and not be bound up by anxiety over what could happen.Dr. Frankenollie wrote:Ben Whishaw’s Michael is a pretty drab and uninteresting figure when compared to his father. David Tomlinson’s George Banks was subtle; a delusional, narcissistic and yet fundamentally decent man, an antagonist for whom we were invited to sympathise with. Michael Banks lacks his father’s depths; we are told he is an artist, yet his vocation never matters and his art never appears. He is too obviously decent to start with for his arc to have any resonance, and his anger at his children is so clearly unusual for him that the whole exercise seems rather unnecessary.
That was clearly an accident, but I definitely agree that "Feed the Birds" should've been given more consideration in this film, maybe even give it a short reprise at some point in Dick van Dyke's scene. At least they made sure to point out that van Dyke's character here was changed in part because of Michael's compassion and desire to give tuppence to the bird lady. I think in a way it also emphasizes how "large" a tuppence or the act of giving is despite how "small" it seems, by the fact that it became large enough to solve the entire plot in this one. Because Michael's act of charity was stolen from him by his father forcing him to put the money in the bank in the first film, the true, large value of what that small act of charity would've been is returned to him. Although, reading RyGuy's post, he's right that Michael gives the tuppence to his father rather than the bank, even if his father puts it in the bank--which I still see as charity / compassion on Michael's part even if directed at someone else, and that compassion was returned to Michael tenfold. Or, in another way, Michael's act helped to save Mr. Banks by leading to him understanding what's important in life (and, further, Mr. Banks does the same thing when he makes the bankers laugh), and Mr. Banks in return ends up saving Michael in this film even if he's not there physically but in "the place where lost things go" the same as Michael's wife. In a way, Michael's problem could be called a lack of faith, especially when he wonders "where did you go" about his wife in his first song. That's Mary's purpose for being there, to make him understand things / people are never really gone.Dr. Frankenollie wrote:The use of some of the original’s songs in the underscore is nice, especially when it uses some of the lesser-known pieces in the appropriate places (The Life I Lead, The Perfect Nanny, even Fidelity Fiduciary Bank), but the approach serves to underline how confused the writing is when Feed the Birds inevitably appears. It makes its cameo alongside Van Dyke’s, in a scene where Mr Dawes reveals that Michael’s “tuppence” of the 1964 film has accrued sufficient interest to handily resolve this sequel’s plot. This clumsy exposition is not only rather thin gruel to give to Van Dyke, but also comically misses the entire point of the tuppence in the first film. After all, young Michael Banks wants to give it to the Bird Woman rather than the bank, a choice that Mary Poppins explicitly presents as the right one, framing it as a choice between compassion and shallow selfishness. This film thus sides with the villains of the original. It’s clearly an accident, but it’s not an isolated incident.
I don't think the Balloon Lady's comment implies that. Mr. Banks was fundamentally changed by the experience at the bank, only he and the other adults forget the magical details of flying up chimneys, floating in the clouds on a balloon, etc. That's a recurring idea in films about the innocence of being a child and the pure imagination / belief you have at that time of life, and how it's often lost once one grows up. That an adult's eyes are often clouded by the desire to be rational to truly see things the same way.Dr. Frankenollie wrote:Mary Poppins Returns also sees the adult Jane compare Michael to their father when Whishaw is shouting angrily; this is baffling, considering the fact that the story of Mary Poppins is how their father becomes a better, kinder man. That Jane would remember George Banks as otherwise is a careless error. But there is a possible explanation by the end of Returns: the Balloon Lady remarks, quite startlingly, that “of course, the grown-ups will forget by tomorrow” and Mary agrees. If this is the case, and George Banks went back to his old ways, and Michael is to go back to his, then Mary Poppins and her visits are pointless. If not, then she and the Balloon Lady are talking rubbish – either way, it doesn’t work. The story of Mary Poppins is to remember what it’s like to be a child, and to treasure the time you have with your family. It’s not the story of a fun day out that’s instantly forgotten.
Reading this interaction written out makes me feel more confident in what I was thinking / writing earlier in my post, that Michael had become his father albeit in a different way. The fact that he's most concerned about what he can afford rather than what the right thing to do is, and how Jane specifically frames taking on Mary Poppins as a nanny as being a charity because she probably can't find work and Michael still doesn't care, reveals he's lost the compassion he once had, that Mary had taught him to have. In that way, Mary came back to reiterate the lesson that she gave when she taught them to “Feed the Birds.”Escapay wrote:Michael: "Jane, have you gone completely mad? I can't afford to take on anyone else!"Mooky wrote: Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe Jane compares Michael to their father only once, referring to his grumpiness somewhat jokingly.
Jane: "Mary Poppins isn't just anyone. Don't you see, Michael? Nobody's hiring nannies anymore. The poor woman has nowhere to go!"
Michael: "Well, neither will we by the end of the week!"
Jane: "You're so grumpy, you sound just like father."
Michael: (indignantly) "I do not!"
Jane: "Give Mary Poppins a chance, you need help just as much as she does."
Albert
I agree, that part was unnecessarily OTT.disneyprincess11 wrote: I thought the second half of the animated sequence and the climax was a little ridiculous. What was even the point of the wolf / Banker symbolism? The fact that there’s a character just like the Banker, to the point of him having a watch (I rolled my eyes hard) is a little far-fetched to begin with.
Sotiris wrote:If you're referring to the fact that it has an annoying melody, gimmicky lyrics, anachronistic rapping that's poorly disguised as patter, the subpar singing talents of LMM, and its existence is completely gratuitous and unnecessary as it adds nothing to either plot or characterization, then yes, you do know!Old Fish Tale wrote:And we know exactly why you hate it.
I don’t think Blunt as MP was quite as iconic as Depp as Jack Sparrow, but I agree that lighthearted roles seem to get unfairly overlooked.Atlantica wrote:Mary Poppins isn't a 'worthy / dark / intense' etc etc film so therefore they felt they didn't deserve it.Just like Johnny Depp being overlooked for the iconic first performance of Captain Jack.
The Mary Poppins expansion/remodel of the UK pavilion is more than I ever dreamed of. Cherry Tree Lane is to me what Hogsmeade and Diagon Alley are to other people. I can’t believe one day, I’ll get to go there!! I’m a little disappointed that the concept art depicts the Emily Blunt Mary and Lin Manuel Miranda. If these characters do come to Epcot, I hope Julie and Dick’s iterations get to remain in the Magic Kingdom— I’m also a bit surprised because I always expected that if the Emily Mary did make it into the parks, she’d be wearing her Royal Doulton dress, not her lovely traveling ensemble.Old Fish Tale wrote:They just announced the Mary Poppins attraction at the United Kingdom pavillion at Epcot is still happening:
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EC1kEX2XoAMmsuh.jpg
There's another photo and it looks like it has Julie's Mary in it: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EC1jTB8UwAAy7NG.jpgUmbrellaFish wrote:The Mary Poppins expansion/remodel of the UK pavilion is more than I ever dreamed of. Cherry Tree Lane is to me what Hogsmeade and Diagon Alley are to other people. I can’t believe one day, I’ll get to go there!! I’m a little disappointed that the concept art depicts the Emily Blunt Mary and Lin Manuel Miranda. If these characters do come to Epcot, I hope Julie and Dick’s iterations get to remain in the Magic Kingdom— I’m also a bit surprised because I always expected that if the Emily Mary did make it into the parks, she’d be wearing her Royal Doulton dress, not her lovely traveling ensemble.Old Fish Tale wrote:They just announced the Mary Poppins attraction at the United Kingdom pavillion at Epcot is still happening:
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EC1kEX2XoAMmsuh.jpg
And the attraction??? I don’t want to get my hopes up that it’s a dark ride... but if it is, I hope they incorporate the music and scenes from both movies.
I understand. I still think it looks more like Julie's Mary with the 'Step in Time' costume. But yes, I hadn't noticed Lin-Manuel's Jack in that photo too. But there's a chance the attraction is so big they combine the characters from both films.UmbrellaFish wrote:The lady in red? I actually think that may be Emily’s Mary in her first Royal Doulton costume— which makes the most sense to me. Julie’s Mary has only met (to my knowledge) in her Jolly Holiday outfit, I think because children may respond more to its frilly “princess” qualities— if they actually bring Emily’s Mary to the parks, I think she will wear her pretty pink Doulton dress for this same reason. You can also see Jack the lamplighter in that concept art, too.
Still, it seems strange to me to trot out Dick van Dyke for a Mary Poppins expansion that may have less to do with the 1964 film than the 2018 film. It’s also strange to me because neither Emily’s Mary or Jack made any appearances at any of the parks during MPR’s theatrical release— or ever, really. I really expected they might give the characters a trial run when the movie came out though. But it is so early days and these kinds of concept art can differ so drastically from the final product, so who knows. Ultimately, it’s more important to me that the attraction honors the 1964 film than who the face characters depict.
Most Mary Poppins merchandise depicts the character in silhouette, which I have always guessed is primarily to avoid paying royalties to Julie Andrews. That said, you can certainly buy plenty of official Disney Mary Poppins plushies and pins that depict Julie Andrews inside the theme parks. Furthermore, Mary still meets daily in both Epcot and the Magic Kingdom and appears in the Fantasmic! finale dressed as Julie Andrews in the “Jolly Holiday” segment— not to mention all the other parks around the world. Unlike 99% of other characters with scheduled meet and greets, Mary Poppins never has a PhotoPass photographer with her. This is because if Disney sold guests photos of Mary, some of the profits would have to be shared with Julie Andrews (and the Travers estate). On the other hand, Johnny Depp’s Jack Sparrow does meet with PhotoPass— we can perhaps assume that modern contracts are more favorable for Disney in this regard. Every day, Mary meets hundreds of families in both the theme parks and if she could have a PhotoPass cast member attending her, Disney could make up for a lot of untapped revenue. If the Julie Andrews Mary Poppins stops appearing at the theme parks, it is likely a business decision made by Disney and not Andrews’ team. Of course, this is assuming that Emily Blunt’s (and Lin Manuel Miranda’s) contracts with Disney are more inline with Depp’s than Andrews’.Old Fish Tale wrote: By the way, are they still allowed to use Julie's likeness anywhere? I'm asking because I remember what you said when that 'Practically Poppins in Every Way' book was published and they weren't even allowed to mention her by name in it. Is everything still okay between her and Disney?