Saving Mr Banks

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If this film were to be summarized in one word, it would be this: charming. It is as sweet as the above trailer would suggest, partially due to the storyline, which initially revolves around the tense interactions between P.L Travers and Walt Disney during the initial development stages of Mary Poppins.

The clashing characters are played fantastically by Tom Hanks, who plays a slightly creepy but generally likable Walt Disney and Emma Thompson, who does a fantastic job as a stern P.L Travers. The supporting cast, including B.J Novak and Jason Schwartzman as the Sherman Brothers and Colin Farrell as P.L Traver’s father, also do a pretty good job.

In addition to this, the bright pastel colours of L.A contrast brilliantly with the dull, drab and grey world of P.L Travers and this is helped by the use of setting and costume to really help the audience understand the differences between the two clashing personalities.                                                                                                                                                                                                                             The aforementioned sweetness of the film’s present is then balanced out by the heart-breaking story of P.L Traver’s past, which is cleverly interwoven through brilliantly edited flashbacks and is again quite well-acted. Another great thing about the film is the way in which both the songs and actual footage of the original film are used. There is a particular scene involving the song ‘Fidelity Fiduciary Bank’ which exemplifies both these elements, as essentially two scenes are shown and they reflect on each other brilliantly. Other than these elements, everything else about the film is generally average- there isn’t much else to say, other than that it is a sweet and clever film with good performances and some very well done editing, as well as lots of clever storytelling.