Butler's Cinema Scene

Emily Blunt

“MARY POPPINS RETURNS” My rating: B+ (Opens wide on Dec. 19)

130 minutes | MPAA rating: PG

First, the most obvious question: Is “Mary Poppins Returns” as good as the 1965 original?

Answer: No.  But  it comes close.

Disney’s original “Poppins” is one of — if not the — greatest family films of all time. Everything about it works, from the performances to the writing, the execution, and especially the Sherman Brothers’ astounding score of instantly hummable songs.

So when director Rob Marshall (“Chicago,” “Into the Woods,” “Nine”) took on this sequel, he had a lot to live up to.

Mostly he succeeds. There are a few flat sequences and the new Music Hall-steeped score by Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman, while perfectly serviceable and occasionally inspired (the moving “The Place Where Lost Things Go, for example), is never as catchy as the original.

But Emily Blunt makes for a slyly entertaining Mary, “Hamilton” star and creator Lin-Manuel Miranda makes a solid film debut, and several of the musical numbers  are showstoppers.  A delectable sense of childlike wonder prevails.

The plot cooked up by David Magee, John DeLuca and Marshall draws heavily from P.L. Travers’ nine “Poppins” books, and in many instances offers a sort of variation on high points from the ’65 film.

The setting has been advanced from pre World War I London to the Depression era.  Michael and Jane Banks, the kids from the original, are now adults (played by Ben Whishaw and Emily Mortimer).  Michael, the widowed father of three, still works at the bank where his father was employed; Jane, taking a cue from her suffragette mother, is a labor organizer.

Michael, who is hopeless with money, is about to lose the family home to foreclosure by his own employer (represented by two-faced exec  Colin Firth).  The family’s only hope is to find a small fortune in bank shares purchased decades earlier — but the papers have all gone missing.

Into this tense situation who should appear but Mary Poppins (Blunt), who in her own no-nonsense way organizes and entertains  the incredibly adorable kids (Pixie Davies,  Nathanael Saleh and Joel Dawson) with a series of fantastic adventures.

Our narrator through all this is a lamplighter, Jack (Miranda), who serves precisely the same function as did Dick Van Dyke’s chimneysweep Bert in the original. Introduced with the song “Lovely London Sky,” Jack is featured in “Trip a Little Light Fantastic”  featuring a host of dancing lamplighters that mirrors the “Step in Time ” extravaganza from 1965.

Emily Blunt, Lin-Manuel Miranda

Echoes of the “Jolly Holiday” number in the Julie Andrews version are all over “The Royal Daulton Music Hall” in which Mary and company are transported to an animated world whose colorful inhabitants include the dancing penguin waiters from the first movie. Alas, the sequence ends in a carriage chase through the woods that provides some brief moments of excitement but seems mostly superfluous.

Also unremarkable is “Turning Turtle,” in which the children meet Mary’s eccentric Russian cousin (Meryl Streep), who lives in a house that periodically turns upside down so that the inhabitants find themselves standing on the ceiling. It’s a rather barefaced attempt to emulate the spectacularly entertaining Ed Wynn number “I Love to Laugh” from the original (that’s the one where the characters float like helium-filled balloons). Problem is, the song’s not very interesting and Streep’s thick accent makes most of her dialogue indecipherable. The hard fact is that the sequence is unnecessary.

Indeed, the film’s entire second hour suffers from pacing issues,

Okay, those are my major gripes, but they are inconsequential in light of the film’s overwhelming aura of feel-good. The movie’s heart is in the right place and Marshall and company repeatedly hit the sweet-spot nexus of nostalgia, childhood innocence and adult cynicism (which is acknowledged but really hasn’t a fighting chance).

By the time 91 year-old Dick Van Dyke (as the kindly/cranky owner of the bank) leaps upon a desktop for some fancy hoofing, tears of joy are the only possible response.

Blunt possesses a terrific singing voice; even better (though perhaps not for Travers fanatics), her Mary is curiously likable despite her often imperious manner.  She’s so damn watchable.

Miranda lacks conventional movie star charisma, but he makes up for it through sheer talent.

The kids are cute without being cloying, Wishaw has some nice moments as the ineffectual but utterly decent father, and you can even see Julie Walters as the Banks’ longtime maid and Angela Lansbury as a balloon seller (this film’s version of the “Feed the Birds” lady).

So…if “Mary Poppins Returns” isn’t an instant classic, it’s still a terrific experience for the entire family.

Go. Enjoy.

| Robert W. Butler