The Return of Mary Poppins

Poster outside the AMC Theater at
Castleton Mall, Indianapolis. 12/25/18 (dwm)

I wager a high percentage of people living today have seen Mary Poppins.

The classic 1964 film starred Julie Andrews and Dick Van Dyke is iconic.

And the legacy created by that movie leads to high expectations for Mary Poppins II.

I think Mary Poppins Returns holds up.

Emily Blunt isn't Julie Andrews, but she captures the essence of being practically perfect in every way.

Lin Manuel Miranda is Jack, a lamplighter protege of Bert, who has a glint in his eye filled with magic possibilities.

The story picks up Jane and Michael Banks - now grown and forgetting what Mary Poppins taught them - and Michael's three children.

His wife, the mother of the three adorable kids, died months earlier leaving a father bedraggled and worried about making ends meet.  It's a scenario which requires an imaginative approach.

The music is outstanding.  Fifty-four years after the original movie, music now becomes popular or viral in different ways, so I don't if one of the songs will become "Supercalifragilisticexpalidocious."  My favorites: A Cover is Not the Book, The Royal Doulton Music Hall, Underneath the Lovely London Sky, and Turning Turtle.

There are a couple of thought-provoking and moving tunes.  "A Conversation" reveals the problem Mary needs to solve; "The Place Where Lost Things Go" unveils the solution.

The movie is a rollicking journey for a new batch of Banks children - Annabel, John, and Georgie - and the father and aunt who realize all that the mystical nanny taught and retaught them.

I suggest you see this movie, and I'm pretty sure you will see it again... and again in years to come.