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Mary Poppins (1964)
Not my spoonful of sugar
One night, I was originally going to watch "No Country for Old Men", but despite iMDB and my Roku saying that it was on Paramount+, it wasn't. So instead, I decided to watch Mary Poppins since that was also on my watchlist, and I've heard plenty of people praise it as well. I wasn't exactly expecting a masterpiece, but at the very least an enjoyable watch.
I was certainly surprised after watching this, but for all the wrong reasons. For starters, it is an incredibly annoying film to go through. A good amount of the characters were irritating, specifically Dick Van Dyke as Bert. Whenever I heard him speak, it was like nails on a chalkboard. There were also various points in the story where it was trying to come off as charming or hilarious, but it just ended up being just straight cringe. The sequence where the characters are laughing with the floating man legitimately felt like torture to the point where I considered stopping the film.
Now, in one breath I could admire how this film incorporated animation, but when you really look at it, it hasn't really aged all that well. In fact, I would argue that the entire segment where the characters walk through the park could be cut out entirely and the film wouldn't be any different. Much of the animated sequences left me feeling unimpressed, and at times perplexed by how blurry and poorly put together they look. And before anyone tells me that it's early for it's time, the visuals itself feel uninspired, the green screens don't look that good, and keep in mind that this is the same year that "Kwaidan" was released, whose visuals are stellar by comparison.
Also, I hate to say it, but I didn't really find Mary Poppins to be interesting of a character at all. I never really found Mary Sue type characters to be interesting in the slightest, mainly because I find them to be boring and at times obnoxious. In a way, I find her character to contribute to perhaps one of the biggest weaknesses I found with this film, which is that it's so boring. It especially became grating during the last half hour of the film, where I began successfully predicting how the events would turn out. By the time it got to the flying kite song and Poppins flying off into the sky, I felt emotionally drained.
There were a couple things that I appreciated about the film though. I did appreciate how they enforced some good morals throughout the film, and there were a couple of scenes that had some good payoff to them such as when the kids cause chaos at the bank. Plus, I should mention that the Step in Time music number was legitimately entertaining to watch.
Overall, I can understand why people enjoy this film, and there were a couple scenes that I enjoyed, but there are still a lot of components about the film that I didn't really enjoy, and at times I found to be unbearable. While I can understand how this can be seen as a comfort film among others, to me it didn't really feel like that. If anything, it was too annoying to be any sort of comfort.
Oh, and I watched "No Country for Old Men" the next day on Amazon. That movie is an easy 10/10.
Hauru no ugoku shiro (2004)
Solid Ghibli film, but ultimately confusing
I feel like Ghibli is at its best when it's simple in structure and it's overall goals, but it gives plenty of room for the viewer to explore on their own. Films like Princess Mononoke and Spirited Away are great examples of this. But while Howls Moving Castle is certainly ambitious and has a lot to say, the way it's presented ends up being a jumbled mess.
The first half of the film is relatively straightforward and has a good idea of what it's going for, but as it continues, it feels more confused with itself. Playing devils advocate, it is based on a book, so I would understand if it's not up to par with its adaptation. However, I think that a film adaptation of a book should act on its own without solely relying on its original material in order to make sense of things. And there are so many moving proponents within the story that it leaves more questions than answers, and not in a good way either.
But one thing that really annoys me is how one of my friends (a Ghibli fan) gets mad at me whenever she's reminded of the score I gave this, even though everyone in my social group admits that it gets confusing in the second half. As of writing this review, I'm giving it a 7/10 (though it might go down to a 6/10), which is a good score. I do enjoy the film overall, but I just find it irritating that people point out flaws of their favorite film, and yet expect you to give it a higher score anyways. If there's an aspect how a storyline is presented in terms of pacing and world building that throws me off, I'm obviously not going to enjoy it to the full extent of some die hard fans.
But even with its issues, I still think it's an okay film. I just think that Ghibli has done better.