What may have seemed, at least on the surface, to be a fatuous seersucker made exclusively for a matinee audience between
the ages of eight and thirteen, has actually become ---in my mind, anyway--- a Hollywoodland art film made by a fat cat, using
the aus-
pices of his wealth and reputation as a family-oriented spokesperson to create a subtle cinematic passion play of phantasmagorical
proportions.
As a boy, my mother took me to the movies every week. I remember seeing Mary Poppins, Fantasia, Cinderella, Mickey's
Christmas Carol, Batman, and such 'Poppins' retreads as the 1971 lackluster Bedknobs & Broomsticks. They never
meant much, though...at least not intellectually, to my mind; they were simply external stimuli, a colorful, animated tableux
to delight the senses that only a child is in possession of...before we are robbed of this susceptibility by the harsh awakenings
that come in real life. "Hey, pa...now that I'm a paraplegic from jumping off the roof of our garage, I think I learned something
about movies: people really can't fly."
So I had that susceptibility, that gift of wonder and bemusement. This put me at both an advantage and a disadvantage.
I had the luxury of innocence and an illusory imagination, but I couldn't revel in it because, alas, I hadn't the intellectual
capacity with which to appreciate it. I was merely in a darkened theater so mommy and I could eat a lot of buttery popcorn
and see a man in a blue leotard fly over a city that was make-believe.
As a young adult, and with the aid of the DVD fully-restored, digitally remastered widescreen format at my disposal, I
was able to enjoy Walt Disney's opus on a kinesthetic and, some might say, psychoanalytical level. First off, it should be
noted that I had an erection for Julie Andrews since I was old enough to get one. Consequently, that came around the time
I had the pleasure of seeing my very first Blake Edwards movie, Victor/Victoria, in which Andrews played a humble,
insolvent singer who was part George Orwell, part Anais Nin. In Victor/Victoria, the titular dame (Julie Andrews, or
is it Andew Julie?) decides to masquerade as a man, finding that the corollary exalts her from obscurity, placing her among
the ranks of the noveau riche. Something about this rags to riches girl in drag (sort of an early sign that Britney Spears
would later hypnotize me in a tuxedo at the 2000 Mtv! Movie Awards) really thrilled my little heart.
Anyway, without getting off the topic too much, I got to see Mary Poppins again. What I found was a preponderance
of nuance, a flare for special effects and set pieces that were before their time, and a dexterity on the part of screenwriters
Bill Walsh and Don Dagradi (who crafted the multi-faceted script with mastermind/benefactor Disney and director surrogate
Robert Stevenson). Not only should the film have been included among the best films to watch at a lethargic Saturday night
pizza binge at your frat house in John Hulme and Michael Wexler's video guide Baked Potatoes, but it also gives the
tuned-in film critic much to ponder while wired on coffee and beating the clock.
There are very few mainstream hits regarded as worth seeing by mainstream critics that are imbued with more than a slight
of hand portion of symbolism. To name the few I feel like mentioning, they are Fantasia, Paul Thomas Anderson's Punch
Drunk Love,
David Fincher's adaptation of Chuck Palahniuk's Fight Club, Oliver Stone's Natural Born Killers, Tobe Hooper's
Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Quentin Tarantino's Pulp Fiction, The BEATLES' A Hard Day's Night, School
of Rock and David Lynch's entire ouevre.
But Mary Poppins is an anomaly, possessing more substance, idiosyncracy and implicit, inexplicable metaphor in its
130 minute running time than some of the best independent films combined. For example, there's the bumbling, hirsute and uneducated
character of Bert (Dick van Dyke) who is a neighborhood friendly and reputable handyman who does what he needs to do to get
by,
impressing everyone without need for assiduity. Then there is the heroine of the film, Poppins herself, who is the antithesis
of Bert:
bedizen, demure and persuasive, adroit, witty and maternal...or, as her character professes time and time again, "practically
perfect". It would seem that their disparities would cause a natural dichotomy, a feud even. Surely, in any other movie world,
it would be frowned upon for a woman of her class to be seen with such a low-caste individual. But, nevertheless, they share
a camaraderie not unlike the many talents and flavors that make this composite movie what it is.
In fact, everything comes in doubles in this film, from the two opposed Wanted ads for a nanny (one written by the obtrusive,
Conservative patriarch and the other by is two innocent, treacle children) to the screenwriting duo and the musical numbers
(which usually segue from giddy to firm and dictatorial in tone). Again, I can cite the contrasts betwixt Mary Poppins and
Bert as the quintessential metaphor of the movie. By the denouement, the invariably dirty but gregarious Bert had replaced
Poppins as the friendly, compassionate elder/role model. Poppins, even for all her rosiness and iridescence, cannot maintain
her influence over the children, the cadre of family members, maids and townsfolk. Bert, on the other hand, achieves this
in a Taoist way, without Poppins' erudite faculties or presumed super powers and without much etiquette of his own either.
When one thinks of opposites, it seems second nature to think immediately of Good and Evil, especially in the sense that
philosopher Friedrich Neitzsche classified them in. They are, after all, two complete opposites that, much like symbolism,
can neither be seen nor proven. Good and Evil or, as in Mary Poppins' case, Ms. Poppins and Bert, co-exist within society
because stability and morale call for a semblance of both. The fact that Poppins descends upon Cherry Tree Lane in the movie
from up on a cloud is testament to the belief that she must represent Good and farther proof that there are religious connotations
to this film, most likely deliberate.
It is Bert's surface vicariousness and prevalent reputation that obviously brings me to the conclusion that, according
to Gospel, he could be the anti-Christ. Take his Taoist attitude and you've got a walking, talking, sometimes singing and
dancing embodiment of Crowley's Thelemic beliefs, that we should not interfere in the affairs of others and that one should
do what thou wilt. More evidence of the anti-Christ is found in Poppins' bedtime lullaby to the children before their big
morning trip to the bank with daddy. In "Feed the Birds", Poppins sings the children to sleep while apprising them unconsciously
of a woman whom they will encounter later on. This reminds me of Huxley's Brave New World, in which quasi-Utopian scientists
condition a child's thinking at an impressionable age by administering hypnopaedia during the night.
The snow globe transubstantiating into a vast, matutinal edifice for a homeless woman who feeds birds is, by the way, a
visual morsel to be marveled at and savored in the aforementioned sequence.
One of the funniest, wittiest and most thought-provoking turns the movie takes is in the sequence that precedes the aforesaid
one. This scene takes place in the patriarch (David Tomlinson)'s study, and offers us another serving of brain candy. Poppins
is about to get sacked, as it were, by the irate, traditionalist father. But she turns the situation on its head, singing
a song to Daddy Banks that proves his point while also enforcing her own agenda. The patriarch stares in awe as Poppins tells
him what she claims he just told her, meaning, quite simply, that the whole scene is nothing more than a device to prove how
Good or Evil can easily induce ossification in man. And, oftentimes, you cannot tell the two apart because they are invariably
the same.
Then, of course, there are the parts that make you question whether the filmmakers weren't opium eaters or the first Hollywood
potheads. A nanny allowing two small children to have a tea party on the ceiling at Uncle Albert's house? The Chimney Sweep
world?
On a more James Lipton-esque note, Julie Andrews' performance her is nothing short of magical, in many of the same ways
that the far out visual phenomena of the movie is magical. As Poppins, she delivers a convincing portrayal of a nanny, and
a wealth of binary facial expressions that hint at uncertainty. In other words, not only do we not know whether she is saint
or Satan, angel or aberration, but she doesn't know either. This precarious existence she carves out for herself in the movie
calls to mind the beginnings of both Christ and Lucifer, further intimating my overall point to this terribly long treatise.
Poppins commands carte blanche in some scenes, but subjugates with an air of razzmatazz at her own dominance and manipulative
abilities.
Maybe instead of demystifying Neitzsche, translating Dostoyevsky and quoting Aleister Crowley, we should be watching more
motion picture confections as awesome and protean as Mary Poppins. A grain of salt should help this screed of mine
go down, jsut as sugar helps the medicine go down. But who knows? Maybe you've enjoyed this review, as I surely enjoyed Mary
Poppins. Or maybe, like me, you have already seen the movie and written your own over-analytical review of it while under
the influence of psychedelics. Hey, stranger things have happened. Like weird ladies flying around with umbrellas.
