Nanny McPhee Returns: Charm, Excitement, and Relevance (by Hayley Watkins)
If you’ve seen any trailers for the new movie Nanny McPhee Returns, you know it has something to do with unruly children, a magical nanny, and swimming piglets. But it really has much more to it.
The film is set up by depicting three misbehaved farm children who are being raised by their mother, Isabel Green, while their father is away fighting in World War II. The children are dirty and always fighting, but Mrs. Green hardly has any time to discipline them because she is working, keeping up the farm, and trying to avoid her husband’s sleazy brother who wants her consent to sell their home. The story begins with the Green family preparing for their mother’s niece and nephew to come stay with them from London. They are trying to clean up the house and the farm to accommodate these refined children.
Of course, nothing seems to go right. The owner at the shop Isabel works at, Mrs. Docherty, is losing her memory and misplacing all the goods, the cousins come a day early and are terribly rude, and Uncle Phil’s ulterior motive for trying to sell the farm is to pay off his gambling debts. Just in time, Nanny McPhee shows up to save the day.
The casting is near perfect; with Emma Thompson being her lovely, but firm, self as Nanny McPhee, Maggie Gyllenhall is wonderful as the exasperated Mrs. Green; and Maggie Smith delightful as the slightly kooky Mrs. Docherty. The children actors are all quite capable, with Rosie Taylor-Ritson playing up the comedy best, as cousin Celia. Rhys Ifans is a bit over the top as Uncle Phil, but it works in a movie with so much magic anyway. The film also includes fine cameos by Ralph Fiennes and Ewan McGregor.
It seems as if the filmmakers have discovered CG (character generation) animation since the first Nanny McPhee, and have slightly overused it. Some are done very well, like the synchronized swimming pigs for instance (Thompson’s own favorite scene in the film). At other times though, it is a bit exhausting. The movie is also extremely touching, in the way that Mrs. Green loves her children so much, she will do anything to provide for them, including sacrificing time with her brood to work and keep the farm going until their father has returned.
The film also touches on some darker themes that children today can relate to, like growing up during wartime, foreclosure, gambling, loss of a parent, divorce, and dementia. But every bad thing is counteracted by something good, and all the children learn how to solve problems themselves, which is quite empowering for the younger audience members.
All in all, it is quite a charming movie, with enough poop jokes to make the kids laugh (and maybe the adults) and stay interested. You shouldn’t worry about that though, it might be hard to drag them out of the theater when it’s over!
Review contributed by Hayley Watkins, a high school sophomore, who had the opportunity to meet and interview Emma Thompson during her New York publicity tour.
Read Helen Jonsen (Working Mother)’s interview with Emma Thompson. http://www.workingmother.com/BestCompanies/celebrity-moms/2010/08/actress-emma-thompson-working-mom
