'A British bank is run with precision!'
"Mary Poppins" is a lively family musical that fashions an inviting fantasy world out of Edwardian London. It is a rare film that successfully incorporates potshots at fox-hunting, accessible song craft and an exploration of parenting.
Before the arrival of Mary 'practically perfect in every way' Poppins, we are introduced to the children's parents - too busy with their various concerns to truly give their children any time. Mrs Banks (Glynis Johns) is a skittish campaigner for women's suffrage; Mr Banks (David Tomlinson) is a patriarch of the old-school, a moralising leftover from the Victorian era. A Galsworthian man of property, business and propriety.
Disney's view of London has a strange charm all of its own: a delusional old sea captain and 'crew' presiding over a mock-ship in the sky; sooty chimney-sweeps engaging in elaborate rooftop choreography; an absurdly penny-pinching banking business located in a grandiose building of Neo-Classical proportions, propped up by Athenian columns. A police constable (Arthur Treacher) every bit as reassuring as old George Dixon of Dock Green himself. One gets a sense of the London of E. Nesbit; the progressive middle-classes influenced by Oscar Wilde, George Bernard Shaw and the Webbs, captured in novels like "The Story of the Treasure Seekers" (1898). There is social change, yet there are still advertisements for nannies placed in The Times; still straight-faced claims that 'the British pound is the admiration of the world'.
The dialogue and song lyrics are crafted with a good deal of wit and lightness of touch: from the famously long nonsense word I needn't reproduce, to odd mentions of 'rum punch', to 'Chim Chim Cheree' to the stately vocabulary afforded Mr Banks in speech and song, it is a film that takes joyous liberty with language. Some of the lyrics match W.S. Gilbert in their satirical capturing of the English gentleman.
Julie Andrews? Well, she is perfectly cast as the utterly strait-laced lady of misrule, Mary Poppins. The chaos she creates is controlled, and with a decided point: to educate both children and parents, coating some unpalatable truths in sugar. Bert and Poppins work to bring the family together, helping the children to understand their father, and vice versa. As with so many family films, there is explicit criticism of capitalist greed and an assertion that people will see the error of their ways and behave better: the bankers forgive Mr Banks and he is accepted back into the fold.
As David Thomson argues in his seminal Biographical Dictionary of Film, Julie Andrews only really made sense in films of this particular time; her Poppins is redolent of an era marked by its security, despite JFK's assassination and the Cuban Missile Crisis. She captures a pre-Beatles practicality; an Englishness of controlled amusement but little time for 'frivolity'. A cheeriness underpinned by responsibility, only the coyest hints of sexuality permitted (in a brief moment with Van Dyke in the painting sequence). P.L. Travers, the author of the original novels, thought that her Poppins was diluted, made rather too palatable. It is interesting to speculate what a Glenda Jackson or Diana Rigg could have made of the role.
Of course, the Van Dyke accent is awful, wandering between stage cockney and his own, and I do confess to some irritation at his incessant, Donald O'Connor-in-your-face performance, but it fits within the context of what is a stylised fantasy London; indeed, an American imagining of it. It will be interesting to compare with the same year's "My Fair Lady".
David Tomlinson is perhaps the unsung hero of the film, indeed its heart; his Mr Banks is an utterly convincing archetypal traditionalist who gradually opens up, becoming a man who can relish his own absurdity; who learns to live anew. His songs are my favourites of the film - particularly the late, reflective one ('A man has dreams'). The child actors somehow manage the feat of being enthusiastic without being cloying. It is a limitation, however, that Glynis Johns is not given more to do; her character undergoes little development in comparison with her husband.
Whilst there are minor reservations and gripes to be found, the life-affirming qualities of this film cannot be denied. It is an achievement - a monument even - that Disney has not been able to surpass; offering something for everyone, child and adult alike. Bankers and fox-hunters not withstanding.
"Mary Poppins" is a lively family musical that fashions an inviting fantasy world out of Edwardian London. It is a rare film that successfully incorporates potshots at fox-hunting, accessible song craft and an exploration of parenting.
Before the arrival of Mary 'practically perfect in every way' Poppins, we are introduced to the children's parents - too busy with their various concerns to truly give their children any time. Mrs Banks (Glynis Johns) is a skittish campaigner for women's suffrage; Mr Banks (David Tomlinson) is a patriarch of the old-school, a moralising leftover from the Victorian era. A Galsworthian man of property, business and propriety.
Disney's view of London has a strange charm all of its own: a delusional old sea captain and 'crew' presiding over a mock-ship in the sky; sooty chimney-sweeps engaging in elaborate rooftop choreography; an absurdly penny-pinching banking business located in a grandiose building of Neo-Classical proportions, propped up by Athenian columns. A police constable (Arthur Treacher) every bit as reassuring as old George Dixon of Dock Green himself. One gets a sense of the London of E. Nesbit; the progressive middle-classes influenced by Oscar Wilde, George Bernard Shaw and the Webbs, captured in novels like "The Story of the Treasure Seekers" (1898). There is social change, yet there are still advertisements for nannies placed in The Times; still straight-faced claims that 'the British pound is the admiration of the world'.
The dialogue and song lyrics are crafted with a good deal of wit and lightness of touch: from the famously long nonsense word I needn't reproduce, to odd mentions of 'rum punch', to 'Chim Chim Cheree' to the stately vocabulary afforded Mr Banks in speech and song, it is a film that takes joyous liberty with language. Some of the lyrics match W.S. Gilbert in their satirical capturing of the English gentleman.
Julie Andrews? Well, she is perfectly cast as the utterly strait-laced lady of misrule, Mary Poppins. The chaos she creates is controlled, and with a decided point: to educate both children and parents, coating some unpalatable truths in sugar. Bert and Poppins work to bring the family together, helping the children to understand their father, and vice versa. As with so many family films, there is explicit criticism of capitalist greed and an assertion that people will see the error of their ways and behave better: the bankers forgive Mr Banks and he is accepted back into the fold.
As David Thomson argues in his seminal Biographical Dictionary of Film, Julie Andrews only really made sense in films of this particular time; her Poppins is redolent of an era marked by its security, despite JFK's assassination and the Cuban Missile Crisis. She captures a pre-Beatles practicality; an Englishness of controlled amusement but little time for 'frivolity'. A cheeriness underpinned by responsibility, only the coyest hints of sexuality permitted (in a brief moment with Van Dyke in the painting sequence). P.L. Travers, the author of the original novels, thought that her Poppins was diluted, made rather too palatable. It is interesting to speculate what a Glenda Jackson or Diana Rigg could have made of the role.
Of course, the Van Dyke accent is awful, wandering between stage cockney and his own, and I do confess to some irritation at his incessant, Donald O'Connor-in-your-face performance, but it fits within the context of what is a stylised fantasy London; indeed, an American imagining of it. It will be interesting to compare with the same year's "My Fair Lady".
David Tomlinson is perhaps the unsung hero of the film, indeed its heart; his Mr Banks is an utterly convincing archetypal traditionalist who gradually opens up, becoming a man who can relish his own absurdity; who learns to live anew. His songs are my favourites of the film - particularly the late, reflective one ('A man has dreams'). The child actors somehow manage the feat of being enthusiastic without being cloying. It is a limitation, however, that Glynis Johns is not given more to do; her character undergoes little development in comparison with her husband.
Whilst there are minor reservations and gripes to be found, the life-affirming qualities of this film cannot be denied. It is an achievement - a monument even - that Disney has not been able to surpass; offering something for everyone, child and adult alike. Bankers and fox-hunters not withstanding.