Welcome back, dearest readers, to I’d Like to Blank the Academy! Honestly, we’re still exhausted from our Disney trip, and this is a big one, so let’s get right into it. Spit spot!
Previews
What, if anything, did we know about this coming attraction before we watched it?
Ellen: I only have the fuzziest of memories of this movie to the point where I’m not convinced I’ve ever seen it all the way through. My most recent exposure is probably someone sharing the recut horror trailer to me. Happy Spooky Season!
Tyler: There’s a particular scene in this movie that lived rent free in my brain for years in which Mary Poppins is looking at herself in the mirror and her reflection is doing something different than she is. I’m proud to say that after seeing that scene as we watched parts of this with your family somewhat recently, it no longer freaked me out (as much). Growth!
Plots & Feelings
This one’s pretty self-explanatory.
Short Version (courtesy of IMDb): In turn of the century London, a magical nanny employs music and adventure to help two neglected children become closer to their father.
Long Version (modified from Wikipedia and formatted to fit your screen):
In the skies over London in 1910, with Big Ben looming in the background, a prim woman sits on a cloud, watching the scene below. Mrs. Winifred Banks bustles back to her home after a roaring success at her suffragette rally1. Her excitement over Votes for Women is someone dampened by two facts: her nanny is quitting, and her children are missing! She and the other staff are very nervous for Mr. George Banks, the stern master of the house and a banker, if you can believe it, to come home. He’s understandably unhappy to discover Jane and Michael have run away again, but thankfully the kindly local constable brought them back! They insist they had to chase their poorly-constructed kite into the park, and maybe if Father helped them with one, that wouldn’t happen 👀👀
Ellen: Tale as old as time: kids just trying to con their dad into hanging out with them!
Tyler: Right off the bat we get the moral of this story: there’s more to a family than the father.
Tyler: Two things I found interesting before we even met the Banks family. One, the music in the opening credits switches between instrumental snippets of songs featured later in the movie, a subtle little taste of what's to come. Two, Dick Van Dyke’s Bert breaks the fourth wall and speaks directly to the camera, a move that makes this feel even more like a Broadway adaptation even though it isn’t.
Ellen: That’s called an overture! A staple of the musical genre.
Tyler: I’ve learned so much about music from you Wendtes.
George has had enough of this nonsense, and he takes out a newspaper ad for a stern, tough nanny who will raise the kids to be stoic, bland Brits2 or whatever. He completely rejects the competing list of qualifications adorably presented by his children, going so far as to rip it up and throw it in the fireplace. The next morning, there is a funeral-procession-worth of very serious-looking ladies outside 17 Cherry Tree Lane, but oops! They’re all blown away by a strong wind, and riding that wind with her umbrella is none other than the titular Mary Poppins. She makes quick work of the incredulous George, assuring him she meets all of the children’s specifications, even though he’s not quite sure where she got them.
Jane and Michael are very excited about this newcomer, agreeing with her tape measure that she’s “practically perfect in every way.” That notion is challenged when the first game she proposes is cleaning up the nursery! Their new nanny introduces the children to the concept of task pairing, in this case boring tidying with the much more interesting exercise of practicing magic! Or whatever it is Miss Poppins does. Either way, they have so much fun that the park sounds downright boring in comparison. Luckily for them, they run into Mary’s friend Bert, a jack-of-all-trades whose chalk drawings are more than meets the eye. They blue skidoo right into the countryside!
Ellen: I’m sitting here watching the joy and whimsy that is drawers closing themselves and blocks stacking into bookcases and wondering how on Earth this isn’t a dark ride at Disneyland.
Tyler: I’m barely exaggerating when I say that like 75% of this movie could’ve been lifted entirely for a ride. It’s mind-blowing that it doesn’t exist.
Once in the chalky countryside, the kids immediately run for a carousel just offscreen while Bert and Mary have what you might call a “jolly holiday!” Everyone from the animated penguins to Bert seems enthralled by Mary Poppins. The two humans enjoy tea and raspberry cakes, Bert and the penguins dance, and we finally get the children back. The horses detach from the carousel, and it’s off to the races! Along the way, they disrupt a hunting party chasing a (for some reason Irish) fox, and Mary wins the race by politely asking other jockeys to let her pass. They all celebrate the win by learning the word “supercalifragilisticexpialidocious,” but a rainstorm melts the chalk and the fun is done. Back home, Mary makes sure the kids take some medicine, which tastes shockingly good to them!
Ellen: Everyone’s medicine being a different color and flavor is one of the subtler tricks of Mary’s, and what especially tickled me was hers tasting like rum punch. Mary, you dog!
Hijinks continue as Bert seeks the help of Mary and the children to help get her eccentric uncle off the ceiling! He floats up there from laughing too much, and Mary quite disapproves, but ends up laughing too. After tea on the ceiling, the group heads home, only to be chastised by George for the overly cheery vibes in the home. Mary slyly convinces him to take the children to work the next day, and she tells Jane and Michael about the noble cause of the bird lady who will sell you breadcrumbs for just “tuppence a bag.” The next morning, George won’t let Michael waste his money on such trifles. He and his band of decrepit but passionate3 bankers try to illuminate the children on the virtues of compound interest. Michael loudly demands his money back, causing a run on the bank!
Ellen: It kind of gives you whiplash to see Mary singing and dancing with cartoons and then the next day being anti-laughing? Learning from Wiki-Wiki-What (below) that the original Mary was much more stern clears this up a little, and you can see the P.L. Travers version and the Disney version fighting each other.
Tyler: I got the impression she was more upset that their planned outing of relatively normal chores was disrupted by such whimsy (not to mention that it was whimsy that she herself didn’t initiate). Even still, she was a lot more stern than I remembered!
The kids flee and are immediately lost, but not to worry: Bert finds them! He’s a chimney sweep today, and he returns them home. It’s actually Mary’s day off, so Winifred enlists this soot-covered young man to watch them. He takes them right up the chimney in a rare reverse-Santa-Claus4. Bert and the other sweeps sing and dance across the rooftops, and Mary eventually joins. After a quick rampage through the house, the extraneous men depart, leaving Bert to have a quick heart-to-heart with George about interacting with his children every once in a while. The banker demands an explanation from Mary, who is disinclined to acquiesce to his request. A stricken George returns the tuppence to Michael.
Ellen: It seems among the things she’ll never explain: whence did her powers come? Is her only purpose guiding families back together via nannying? Is she even human? And what is the history between her and Bert?? Do they share a source of power, or are they merely sociable demigods who’ve crossed paths many times over the millennia?
The angry bankers summon George back to the scene of the crime, ready to give him the scolding of a lifetime. The man is at such a loss for words as the unexpected relief of losing his job washes over him, and he exclaims “supercalifragilisticexpialidocious!” He departs, telling the elderly president a joke the kids told him, and the old man laughs so hard he floats into the air (and DIES, we later learn).
Tyler: The way they just casually slip in the fact that he DIED is b-a-n-a-n-a-s.
The next morning, George is missing! Winifred and the constable are fearing the worst, but Mary Poppins has other matters to attend to. She tells the tearful children that it’s time for her to go, as she promised only to stay until the wind changed. George returns, happier than ever, and he repairs the kids’ kite! They all go to the park, where everybody, even the bankers, is flying a kite (that Bert is conveniently hawking). George gets the partner position of the late bank owner. Bert watches Mary float away on her umbrella, saying “Goodbye, Mary Poppins. Don't stay away too long."
Ellen: Kind of a bummer that George’s reward for ending his terrible job that made him terrible is to get the same job back, but with even more responsibility.
Tyler: More like supercapitalismexpialidocious amirite?
Intermission
Even though ILTBTA is free, please indulge us further and enjoy this quick “advertisement.”
This installment of ILTBTA is brought to you by … your old pal Bert!
Oy! It’s your ole pal me, Bert, innit? Whatcha need, luv? Need a questionably-in-tune one-man-band with bespoke poetry? How about some sidewalk chalk creations that you’ll just fall right in love with? Or, listen bruv, how’s yer uncle? Bob, innit? I’ll take right good care of him, I will, just ask old Bert! Or, or, hey, steady on now, how about the best-swept chimney of your life, guv’nor? How about that?
Whether it’s flying a kite, finding your kids, or tap-dancing the night away, I am your man! Your old pal Bert: if I associate with Mary Poppins, how bad could I be??
Wiki-Wiki-Whaaat?
Love a good Wikipedia rabbit hole in search of some fun facts? Us too.
Mary Poppins’ Wikipedia page has some interesting facts and anecdotes that we recommend you read through, but here are a few of our favorites:
Mary Poppins is based on the P.L. Travers book series of the same name. Travers published eight books between 1934 and 1988. Travers eventually sold the film rights to Walt Disney (as portrayed somewhat inaccurately in the 2013 film Saving Mr. Banks), but disliked the film adaptation, specifically the dilution of harsher aspects of Poppins and the use of animation.
The film was directed by British screenwriter and director Robert Stevenson, who was nominated for Best Director for Mary Poppins. Stevenson had a long and successful career, with Variety reporting in 1977 that his track record making movies for Disney made him “the most commercially successful director in the history of films.” By the end of 1976, he had sixteen movies on the magazine’s list of all-time domestic rentals, more than any other director at the time.
Mary Poppins marked the film debut for Julie Andrews, who by then had a successful stage career. She was available after studio head Jack Warner replaced her with Audrey Hepburn for the role of Eliza Doolittle in future-ILTBTA-post My Fair Lady, a role that Andrews originated on Broadway and the West End.
Tyler: Thankfully this seemed to work out well for just about everyone.
Dick Van Dyke famously struggled with the Cockney accent of his character Bert, which is now considered one of the worst accents ever in a movie. In fact, in 2003 movie experts at Empire magazine voted his accent as the second worst of all time, topped only by Sean Connery’s Chicago-Irish accent in The Untouchables (for which he won the Best Supporting Actor Oscar anyway).
Ellen: Just because something is bad doesn’t mean it can’t be iconic!
The dancing penguins scene was innovative for its use of the sodium vapor process, which earned the film the Best Visual Effects Oscar. Here’s an explanation:
“Rather than using the more common bluescreen process to insert the actors into the animated footage, the actors were filmed against a white screen lit with sodium vapor lights, which have a yellow hue. A special camera was fitted with a prism that filtered this light to a separate reel of film, creating a highly accurate matte that could be used to isolate the actors from the background. This created a crisp, clean image and even allowed the partially transparent veil of Mary Poppins's costume to let through light from the background.”
The music and lyrics for Mary Poppins were created by the famed Sherman Brothers (Robert and Richard), whose extensive film credits also include Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, most of The Jungle Book, and The Aristocats. They’re also responsible for the biggest Disney earworm of all, “It’s A Small World,” and the slightly less popular (except in our house) “There’s A Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow” from the Carousel of Progress attraction.
Some of the profits of the film (reportedly around $28 million) were used by Walt Disney to finance the construction of Walt Disney World and its monorail system. The safety system on all monorails is called MAPO (MAry POppins).
In 2018, Disney released a sequel to Mary Poppins called Mary Poppins Returns, directed by Rob Marshall (whom we first met in Chicago) with Emily Blunt in the titular role. The movie features a small role for Angela Lansbury (our friend from Beauty and the Beast and Gaslight, and an early consideration for the leading role) as an old woman who sells balloons in the park. The role was initially written as a cameo opportunity for Julie Andrews, but she turned it down because she felt her presence would unfairly take attention away from Blunt.
Julie Andrews also provided the whistling harmony for the robin in “A Spoonful of Sugar” and the voice for one of the singers in “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious.” Famed “ghost singer” Marni Nixon (whom we learned early on in ILTBTA also provide the vocals for Maria in West Side Story) also voiced the three singing Cockney geese in the “Jolly Holiday” sequence. Nixon later provided the singing voice for Hepburn in My Fair Lady and also played one of Andrews’ fellow nuns in …
Honorable Mentions
What other movies should you be watching?
The Sound of Music is the 1965 Best Picture-winning musical drama about the singing von Trapp family. Based on the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical (itself based on the real-life Maria von Trapp’s memoir), The Sound of Music stars Julie Andrews as a free-spirited nun sent to be a governess to an unruly family (sound familiar?) in Austria. She eventually falls in love with the family and its widowed patriarch, played by Christopher Plummer, and attempts to escape with them all after the Nazis invade Austria. While initial critical reaction was mixed, it was a major box office success, eventually becoming not only the highest grossing film of 1965 but also the highest grossing film of all time, surpassing Gone With The Wind for a time.
But don’t just take the opinions of 1965 moviegoers’ word for it. Ellen accurately described Julie Andrews and her performance “a TREASURE” with the songs being “absolute earworms.” Tyler similarly praised the songs and surprisingly engaging story despite it being a little long. (Honestly, one of the reasons we’re giving it an Honorable Mention instead of a full post is because it’s nearly three hours.) The Sound of Music is available to stream for free with a Disney+ subscription, or can be rented from the other streaming services.
Oscar NomNomNomz
Since we all know a movie is nothing without the food and drink it incorporates.
It’s now time to award the Oscar for Best Snacktor in a Supporting Role5. And the nomnomnominees are:
Tea and raspberry cakes served by the penguin waiters
A spoonful of rum punch flavored cordial
Bread to feed the birds at St. Paul's (tuppence a bag!)
And the Oscar goes to … a spoonful of rum punch cordial! Unfortunately, Tyler drank it in a desperate attempt to kill his sinus infection, so Ellen will accept this award on its behalf.
Fill In The Blank
How did we really feel about The Academy nominating this?
Ellen: I’d like to assure The Academy that they’re tip of the top and cream of the crop (at least until the wind changes)! It’s so much fun, and a lot of that is on the shoulders of Julie Andrews’ charm, which she seems to carry with ease. There’s a lot of creative filmmaking and effects here that keep you dazzled throughout. I agree with Tyler that it doesn’t totally hang together scene-to-scene, and I think that’s in part because there seem to be various lessons it’s trying to teach. The uncharitable read is that it's a morality play wrapped in overlong song and dance numbers (our respective medicine and spoonful of sugar), but I’m more inclined to believe they were just trying to weave staying true to the books with the stage-like style of movie musicals at the time. It’s an instant classic as far as I’m concerned, and I’m glad I can now appreciate it!
Tyler: I’d like to give The Academy two spoonfuls of sugar for downing their medicine (i.e., nominating a Disney movie for Best Picture). What’s not to like about this movie? Sure it’s probably 30 minutes too long and there’s an utter lack of through-plot as you bounce from one whimsical mini adventure to the next, but honestly the latter is kind of refreshing for a Best Picture nominee. Mary Poppins is carried by its toe-tapping songs (that have been stuck in my head all week), the wildly charming lead performances, and the pure uncut whimsy that’s the lifeblood of it all. Throw in some impressive special effects (though I admittedly don’t know where the technology was at the time) and some surprisingly feminist undertones, and you’ve got yourself a delightful movie that more than deserved to be nominated.
Let The Credits Roll
Thanks for reading! Some quick housekeeping as you exit the theatre:
If you have plots and feelings of your own (on the movie or ILTBTA in general), feel free to comment on the post or simply reply to the email. If you liked reading this: tell your friends! If you hated reading this: tell your friends how much you hated it by forwarding it to them!
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ILTBTA is also on Letterboxd, the social networking site for movie fans. Follow us there to read our Spreadsheet comments of our ILTBTA movies, plus our ratings of other movies we watch!
If you’d like to start a wild Best Picture journey of your own, feel free to download a copy of The Spreadsheet. Bonus: checking off the boxes is oddly satisfying.
Post-Credits Scene
Get a sneak peek at the next ILTBTA installment.
For our next post, we’ll be kicking off October with the three-and-a-half-hour, black-and-white epic drama from 1929 … just kidding. Since we’re moving into our house (!) next week, we’ve decided to take a post off from ILTBTA to nurse our Disney hangover and focus on packing and unpacking. We’ll be back in your inbox on October 22nd to celebrate the life of the late great James Earl Jones (and the MLB Playoffs) and slide into home with a post on the baseball classic Field of Dreams.
Until then, in many places, early voting starts this week! And what did Winifred Banks fight for if not for you to exercise your right!
P.S. Here are some pictures of our trip to Disney!
Two arrests! Incredible. #LockHerUp
Sounds like my ex-wife!
Sounds like my ex-wife! (Note: we regretfully forgot to include one of these in our Beauty and the Beast post, so we’re making up for it with an extra one here.)
Earning a respectable 7.8 from the judges
Results tabulated and certified by the accountants at Ernst & Yum™.