Cold Turkey (1971)

Cold Turkey (Norman Lear, 1971) One of the first movies I saw under my own power and financial resources* at the late, lamented John Danz Theatre (Rest in the "116church," for God's sake!—I wonder what they did with the dolphin sculpture in the lobby?). It's one of the clutch of semi-satirical social comedies that wasn't radical enough to offend the oldsters or attract the kids, and took on its subject in a style reminiscent of a soft-core It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World.** It also gave TV-sit-com writers a chance to stretch their writing arms with less restrictive material and work during the summer hiatus.

 

In a PR move, an exec (Bob Newhart) at the Valiant Tobacco Company pushes through a 25 million (!!) dollar incentive to any American city that can quit smoking for a month, in a deal reminiscent of the Nobel Peace Prize. For the depressed community of Eagle Rock, Iowa, that's just lost a military base and is struggling through tough economic times, it's a chance to pull itself up by its filter-tips. And so with the activism of Reverend Clayton Brooks (Dick Van Dyke), the entire town pledges to give up smoking...or die trying.

Low-brow Hi-jinks ensue. The national press (all in the dry forms of Bob and Ray) begin focusing on Eagle Rock, as the nervous population goes through withdrawal and panic attacks and the Valiant executive, fearing that they actually may have to pay up, travels to Iowa to try to sabotage their efforts.

There's a lot of soft-ball satire going on from director Norman Lear (who'd go on to create "All in the Family" and a long string of shows that would require a large book-case to collect all the box-sets), and some low comedy as the Eagle Rockians begin to crack: the mayor's wife (Jean Stapleton) eats pickles (although she calls them "gherkins" ...because it's funnier) to fight the cravings, the town-surgeon (Barnard Hughes) who depended on a relaxing smoke to calm his nerves before surgery is losing his patients, the Reverend turns to the evils of intercourse, of course, (should we call that "taking communion?") and, in the most common sight-gag in the film, any stray animal is kicked and sent flying through the air. It's a sure laugh, but some of the kicks are just brutal. ***

It's a nail-biter for audiences and towns-people alike as the month-clock counts down, but rest assured it ends quite ironically, with some nice cutting jabs at then-President Richard Nixon.

 

It also boasted the first music score by Randy Newman (years and years before The Natural and Pixar) who wrote a pleasant soundtrack and a positively mordant theme song "He gives us all His love," that left audiences walking out of the theater, perplexed.

* Come to think of it, the first movie I saw without parent, guardian or hand-out was probably On Her Majesty's Secret Service, the not-so-lucky double-o-seventh in the "official" James Bond series and the first not to star Sean Connery. The vacancy was temporarily filled—like wood-glue—with the unfortunate George Lazenby. They say that the first "007" actor you see becomes your favorite. I was fortunate enough to start with Lazenby and remain objective!

 

** Cold Turkey was on a double bill with a 1969 comedy called Viva Max directed by Dick Van Dyke Show director Jerry Paris (he also played the Petries' next-door neighbor...Jerry). It starred Peter Ustinov as a Mexican General determined to re-take the Alamo, despite U.S. resistance. Hilarity ensues. It was based on a novel by Jim Lehrer—yes, the anchorman of PBS's "The NewsHour," and frequent presidential debate moderator.

 

***To this day, I find the fast yelp of a dog or a spitting squeal from a cat a sure laugh-getter whenever I do sound design work—PETA be damned. 

 

2023 Update: Yeah, I don't do that anymore. That was a past life. Things are a lot quieter now.

Mary Poppins Returns

Impractically Perfect In Every Way
or
Wind's in the East, Mist Comin' In/Like Something is Brewin', About to Begin/Can't Put Me Finger On What Lies in Store/But I Feel What's To Happen All Happened Before...

Having experienced Walt Disney's Mary Poppins as a child back when it was released in theaters away away back in 1964 and having it seared into my memory as a favorite—even after an adult re-appraisal had me concluding that P.L.Travers iconic flying nanny was something of a bitch—I had many reservations going into Disney's Mary Poppins Returns. 

One should never do that. It's just bad form. It could preemptively spoil one's enjoyment of such things, even if said things are, by nature, sequels, given to expectations and reflections of the first. Prejudices. Better to walk in with the expectations of a child—"Tell me a story!" Take it from there. Put away childish things and preconceptions. Leave the past behind, even though there are traces of echo informing your opinion. Nostalgia is for sissies. Don't let the old influence the new and just (forgive me for using the phrase in regards to another Disney film) "let it go."

(Okay, enough hedging, how is it?) Terrific, actually. I'm not a fan of musicals, but when they're exceptionally well done and the songs have a reason for being there and play with the language, then I become a fan of them. And Mary Poppins Returns delivers. I know when I'm enchanted by a movie—a smile has appeared on my face—and I was flashing incisors throughout most of the movie for just the sheer brio and panache of it. I have minor picayunish quibbles—consigned to near the wrap-up—but I won't spend much time on them. Best to concentrate on what's good, and there's plenty.

The Songs—the filmmakers don't shy away from it, they know they have tough competition from such Sherman Brothers songs as "A Spoonful of Sugar," "Chim-Chim-Cher-ee," "Feed the Birds," "Stay Awake," and, of course, "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious." But they face it head on, not with an overture, but with the first song, the place-setter, featuring Lin-Manual Miranda's "leerie" (lamplighter) on the rounds turning off the gas-lights around London.

Director Rob Marshall (of Chicago and Into the Woods) stages this with lovely swooping camera movements that allow the eye to breathe a little while never distracting from the song, but the song is a gem, and just the first of extraordinarily tuneful melodies that have added complications and variations to the patterns, less repetition, with dexterously placed book-smart, syncopated lyrics by Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman (with consultation from the surviving Sherman Brother, Richard M.). Maybe too dexterous, too complicated for wee folks to wrap their tonsils around. That may not be a bad thing, but might work against the songs becoming immediate "hummable" (that requirement for greatness) standards. It doesn't make them any less noteworthy, though, and there's precious little "filler" material amongst them.

The Plot—The story has Mary Poppins (an extraordinary Emily Blunt) returning to the Banks house at Cherry Lane at the time of "The Great Slump." The Banks children, Michael (Ben Whishaw) and Jane (Emily Mortimer) are now grown and in crisis. Michael still lives there with his three kids, Anabel (Pixie Davies), John (Nathanael Saleh) and Georgie (Joel Dawson), and trying to cope with recent death of his wife and the imminent foreclosure of the family home. Sister Jane is a constant presence helping with the children's care, even though in many ways they are now more grown up than their grieving father, a starving artist who has recently taken a clerk's job at the Fidelity Fiduciary Bank that his father worked for. The head of said bank is the scoundrelly William Wilkins (Colin Firth in slow burn mode) who is a grasping opportunist and has little good about him (save for some laudable anti-discriminatory hiring practices).

The kids are little adults, aware of the family crisis, and in need of a childhood, which Ms. Poppins is there to provide, but also to help Michael get through this rough patch, and help all heal with the grieving process, and not look to the past but embrace the present and the possibilities of tomorrow. Oh..SPOILER ALERT!

Grief is quite a mature theme for a kid's movie (as was the original's premise of the saving of Mr. Banks, who had lost the ability to be a father while handling the role of the bread-winner*). But, Michael, after a life of arrested development (way to go, Mary!) following his bliss sketching and letting his wife deal with the financial ramifications, is now at his wit's end taking an actual job in order to make ends meet, and providing for his family (minus one). Boo to the hoo. This puts a lot of pressure on poor Ben Whishaw to not make Michael a pathetic loser, but, the actor manages to make the character understandable and sympathetic, which shows how fine an actor Whishaw is.

And since we're on the subject: 

The Performances—Look, we all love Julie Andrews—even if you've never supported her movies—and her Mary Poppins is, indeed, practically perfect in ever way. But, give it up to Emily Blunt, her Mary is better, a bit more like the P.L.Travers conception, with less of the obviously loving looks in the eye, but more of the controlling, adroit, slightly conceited, but no less incandescent spirit that is Mary Poppins ("We're on the brink of an adventure, children. Don't spoil it with questions!"). Given her precedent, then she must be perfect in every way. Rest assured, she is, with occasionally surprising additions of sauciness. I'd hire her to look after my kids in a heart-beat.

How is Lin-Manuel Miranda?—he's a surprising choice to portray a cockney labourer, but does he have the charisma to pull it off? Oh, yeah. Miranda has that "gotta dance" enthusiasm that can go either way in one's affections, but the man is such a trooper, he's immediately ingratiating, and welcome every time he appears.

Universally, every performance is accomplished and twinkly, the kids not cloying, and actually endearing, Julie Walters' housekeeper is a stitch, the cameos by Meryl Streep (at one point, Miranda says "I can't quite place your accent..."), Angela Lansbury, and Dick Van Dyke are delightful, all in service to a marvelous entertainment.

Which leads to...

The Production—The staging and direction by Marshall is sumptuous, accomplished, but feels a bit elephantine, almost a bit like the difference between the original Mary Poppins and George Cukor's film of My Fair Lady (the poster displayed above even resembles Bob Peak's poster for that film) released around the same time.** I put that down to the editing, which was a bit snappier in Robert Stevenson's film, but also because computer animation allows for greater scrutiny of images, in contrast to the matte paintings of the original.*** That might account for the feeling of "lingering" in the film. This is merely a "quibble" on my part.

But, when it comes to the traditional animation, Marshall insisted on "old-school" with line-drawn animation for the "Royal Daulton China" sequence, which is seamless and is the best integration of live-action with cartoon since Disney first experimented with it in 1923. It is all-together great and leads to a Music Hall sequence that is delightfully presented and shows off Blunt's and Manuel's musical talents at full throttle. 

I had a big smile on my face throughout a large part of Mary Poppins Returns, the kind that I rarely get most times, but happens in those instances when  a movie not only transports me, but challenges me because it is so smart and accomplished, and where there's ample craftsmanship in every aspect, but it also evokes delight. 

There is so much sturm and drang in movies these days, that it is wonderful to see a good movie that is so sweet during the Holiday season. Makes me nostalgic for those special event movies that catered to the whole family in those times and where everyone would enjoy themselves...and the movie.

Walking out, I thought to myself that the only thing the original had that this one lacks is memory.

But, give it time. This one will become just as cherished and only be more appreciated with repeat viewings.

* Oh, this is just silly, but it makes me think of a mash-up of Mary Poppins with The Godfather where Mary visits Lake Tahoe to help Michael Corleone not lose his family while trying to protect them. 

** In that year's Oscar race, there was a bit of a controversy: Julie Andrews was nominated for Best Actress for Mary Poppins, but also nominated was Audrey Hepburn who was chosen by Warners President Jack Warner to play the role of Eliza Doolittle, which Andrews had originated on Broadway to great acclaim. The choice of Hepburn over Andrews was considered a great snub, but left Andrews available to do Poppins, her first film role.  When Oscar time rolled around, the Academy chose Andrews for Best Actress.

*** The masterful work of Peter Ellenshaw, whose work is acknowledged in the film.