Saving Mr. Banks isn’t really about saving anything—except a time slot in your schedule to see this movie before it is out of the theatres. Time is running out!
Saving Mr. Banks (PG-13) is a drama starring Tom Hanks as Walt Disney and Emma Thompson as P.L. Travers. The film takes place in Los Angeles during the year 1964.
The film is the untold true story behind the making of the beloved children’s movie Mary Poppins. Walt Disney (Hanks) is determined to keep his promise to his daughters to make a movie out of the little book they loved about a nanny named Mary Poppins.
Twenty years after making the promise to his daughters, Disney is able to convince P.L. Travers (Thompson) to agree, but she has a few conditions to this agreement. She does not want Disney to change her legacy into a “rosy-cheeked animation,” which is almost exactly what Disney planned to do. In her eyes, Mary Poppins is a practical, serious nanny, not some magical Hollywood machine. Despite himself, Disney allows her script approval. Travers makes the process as painful as she possibly can.
Ms. Travers had a list of things to get rid of including one of the actors, the music, the animations, the romance between Mary Poppins and Burt the chimney sweep, and Banks family house. She picks fights with Disney, the Sherman brothers who are in charge of music, and Don Dagradi who is the layout artist.
As she is working on getting her way on the script, she has many flashbacks to her childhood. She remembers the events leading to her father’s illness and her mother’s near suicide. Her childhood, where she was cheerful despite adversity, shaped her into the sad and negative woman she has become. When the Sherman brothers and Don Dagradi perform their new ideas for the production of the film, her reaction is priceless.
The background music of the film, musical score by Thomas Newman, set the mood perfectly. When P.L. Travers is meeting Mr. Disney for the first time, the background music made the audience feel excited and cheerful. Walt Disney has a very enthusiastic personality throughout the movie and the music gave an introduction to his personality.
Both Tom Hanks and Emma Thompson are two-time Academy Award winners. They make a dynamic duo.
Tom Hanks, in the movie Polar Express, played a serious conductor, who was never silly. His character only smiled a handful of times during the film. During Saving Mr. Banks, Hanks is always smiling and laughing. The two roles in the films were contradicting but he performed superbly in both.
Emma Thompson, in the movie Brave, voiced the slightly strict but loving mother. Her character truly cared for her children and would go to extremes to protect them. In Saving Mr. Banks, Thompson plays a depressed, dispirited woman who was controlled by the demons in her past. She plays opposite roles, but is magnificent in both.
As a child, one of my all-time favorite movies was Mary Poppins. After seeing Saving Mr. Banks, I love the original movie even more.
The movie leads the audience to believe that P.L. Travers created Mary Poppins as her alter ego. Mary Poppins was everything she wished she could be. According to history, P.L. Travers was outraged about the outcome of the Mary Poppins movie. It was everything she didn’t want it to be. The film Saving Mr. Banks creates a new perspective on Mary Poppins, showing that everything is not what it seems.
