Saving Mary Poppins from Disney and giving the legacy back to P. L. Travers.

Rating: 6/10 (9 December 2013)

It really depends on how much you like Mary Poppins as to how much you'll like Saving Mr. Banks. If you think it's the greatest film ever, then this is perfect for you. If you think anything less, it's difficult to see the point. Since I think Poppins is average at best, it was something that bothered me throughout Banks. What is it about this story that means it deserves a high budget film? As the film is built on the dramatic ironies that Pamela Travers' requests were eventually rejected, is this just the story of how she was yet again disappointed? Ostensibly, it was made because it gives the chance to portray Walt Disney on the big screen. I had already read the script and it felt designed to offer Oscar clips. The character is even introduced into the film with his cabinet of awards behind him. The script was okay, but the flashbacks bogged it down.
The film is quite like last year's Hitchcock. A very basic celebratory perspective for the mainstream audience who don't know much about filmmaking. It's quite disappointing to see filmmakers create such banal representations of themselves rather than revealing some interesting secrets of the business. However, Emma Thompson is the shining beacon and saviour. She puts her heart and soul into Pamela and delivers one of her finest performances in a long time. It is the cast that makes this film, I get giddy thinking about seeing Jason Schwartzman, Bradley Whitford, Paul Giamatti and Tom Hanks sharing a frame together. There's only a few weak links, most notably B.J. Novak who doesn't appear to suit his role and Colin Farrell's ever-scowling wife in the flashbacks.
Fortunately the flashbacks aren't as bad as expected, but they don't benefit the film, especially as it introduces the inspiration for the Mary Poppins character and doesn't develop upon it at all. Hanks is good as Disney, projecting that essential warmth with ease, but he doesn't capture your heart until the humanising speech about his childhood near the end. He's a delight to watch, but not exactly Oscar worthy. Unfortunately the film does feel too often like a made-for- TV production with unimaginative cinematography and sets. Clearly John Lee Hancock is a director-for-hire. I didn't see The Blind Side but I assume it's dealt with similar bad habits of PG cinema with its far too basic representations of English and Americans with alcoholism as the worst sin. It feels like the intellect in the language used is the only thing pushing it towards anything resembling high-calibre filmmaking but sometimes it doesn't fit.
It has interesting points about the power of fiction, storytellers and childhood, but it's too sugarcoated to take with sincerity. But then, nostalgia is a powerful thing and it will work for many people. It certainly justifies the need for the film to dive down the road of the character's childhoods, either in 30% of the film for Travers or a simple speech from Walt Disney. The image of Disneyland in the 1960s resonates even if you haven't been down that road. While the first hour is vanilla and dry, it gets to a point in the second half where it hits poignant moments such as Pamela hugging a Mickey Mouse doll and it ends up quite moving and gently satisfying. I guess if Saving Mr. Banks does anything, it hands the Mary Poppins mainstream legacy back from Disney to Travers, but is it really worth an expensive star-studded film and a £10 ticket for that? It'll be on Sunday morning TV forever now at the very least, double-billed with Poppins no doubt.
6/10