Saving Mr. Banks is a biopic telling the story of how Walt
Disney negotiated the rights for Mary
Poppins with the author, P.L.
Travers. And that's it! There's your plot summary! There are all these
conflicts they had with developing the script, flashbacks to Travers's
childhood and awesome 1960's sets in there too.
There are many things I love in this movie. I love the telling of
a story about what a studio goes through in order to get the rights from a book
to adapt it into a film. That happens to be one of the biggest studios ever for
one of the most successful movies of all time. I love all the subtleties in it
that only Disney nerds like me would know. I was going totally crazy during the
scene where they visited Disneyland just like if I were there in real life! I
loved how it soaked in the time period it took place in. The performances were
great and you could tell the actors were much invested.
That is the major draw in this film, the performances; especially
the two leads. On one hand, there is a person many people may not know. On the
other, you have a character EVERYONE knows. Emma Thompson's performance was
great. I really believed her character and her motivations. She wasn't too abundantly
rude and obnoxious and you can see where she is coming from with opposing this
idea. The rest of the cast did a great job as well as they were all interesting
in their own ways.
Then there is Tom Hanks as Disney. Let's start with the role
itself. This is a role playing as someone EVERYONE knows so well is insanely
difficult. If you mess up, EVERYONE is going to tell. It is similar to playing
a US president or biblical figure. Playing such a huge public figure like Walt
Disney is not easy and was a huge move for this movie. That being said, Hanks
does a good job, but this isn't his best. We've seen Hanks play roles based of
real life people and he does great every time. With this, I didn't see Walt
Disney, I saw Tom Hanks playing Walt Disney. I felt like some of his mannerisms
and the way he talked was not perfected enough. I still heard Captain Phillips
with that Mid-Western accent. I can't say it was bad because Hanks has proven
himself as an actor and this is a challenging role.
The only thing I did not like about this film was the flashback
sequences regarding Traver's childhood. At times it slowed the movie down and I
wanted to go back to the 1960's and continue with that story. It felt like it
was a different movie that got tangled up into the other one. Showing Traver's
tough childhood could have just taken a single scene. Instead we are
interrupted by multiple scenes of uncomfortable situations and disengaging
acting. I felt like these parts were boring and a bit excessive. I appreciated
that it brought a more dramatic tone for the film so that it is not too cheesy,
but it needed to be tone down just a little. Another tid-bit that threw me off
was the ending. In the real story, Travers went up to Disney and said “I like
Julie Andrews but I hated Dick Van Dyke, re-do everything.” In this film they
didn’t go into full detail about what happened after the screening, but they
did show Travers crying during. I think this was a bit out of character. If she
was pissed off about the penguins and Dick Van Dyke in the movie, why would she
suddenly start crying? That is such a large change in emotion and felt
unnatural.
I wish there were more autobiographical stores about Walt Disney.
His life was so interesting and so many things happened surrounding the company
that it would make for an interesting movie or mini-series. Disney may have not
been the perfect person it is difficult getting the green light for anything
that tells his story. I feel like a lot could be said about the starting of the
company, the building of the theme parks, all the successes and failures they
endured and maybe even the struggles they went through after his passing. I
felt like Saving Mr. Banks was a good start and could start a
foundation for more improvement. This was a very enjoyable film and I liked the
mixed tone of dramatic and comedic. Live action movies produced by Disney tend
to struggle to get my attention for being too cheesy or bland, but this one
definitely changes all of that.
Grade: A
So maybe I should get around to watching Mary Poppins now....
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