★★★☆☆

The sequel is never quite as good as the original.

In this case I don’t know if anyone “of a certain age” could provide a fair review of Mary Poppins Returns. If you were a little kid back when people actually clapped at the movie theater, the original Mary Poppins was pure magic. I don’t care how big of an alcoholic Dick Van Dyke was back in the day, he could do it all on screen. Sing, dance, be goofy as all get-out, not minding the difference between people laughing at him instead of with him.

Going to the moves was a big deal

To its credit, this sequel tries to be very faithful to the original, having copious quantities of song and dance. They even have what looks like the original style animation for the cartoon characters. Yes, there is a really big dance routine worthy of a Carol Brunet Show grand finale. Perhaps I’m just too old? Perhaps I simply wanted the same awe and wonder I felt as a child?

Going to the movies as a child was a big deal. Theaters had air conditioning and homes did not. You dressed up. Not your Sunday best, but nicer clothes than normal. A movie like this in a world without video games or computer generated graphics was just magic.

Mary Poppins Returns really tried to capture that magic, but there was fifty years of technical advances working against them.

Welcome nod to the past

A really big shout-out must be given to casting. Bringing in Dick Van Dyke and Angela Lansbury at the end was a really welcome nod to the past. I don’t care if he was so old they had to have a stunt double perform Dick Van Dyke’s tap dance routine or not. (I’m hoping he did it himself!) It was a really welcome nod to the past. No, Angela Lansbury wasn’t in the original movie, but Murder She Wrote has been on television seemingly forever. Most importantly it was on a basic over-the-air channel poor people could watch. I won’t be surprised if someone tells me one of those old show channels like TV Land, MeTV, or the Hallmark Channel are running it even today.

This movie did prove one thing to me. Our parents had it really good when it came to kids movies. Mary Poppins presented awe and wonder to all. In a post Harry Potter world it’s kind of hard to bring that same level of magic to a musical. I do applaud them for trying and I thank them whole heartedly for the not to the past at the end.

For more movie rental suggestions you might want to try list one and list two.