Saving Mr. Banks

"It smells of chlorine... and sweat," is author P.L. Travers' (played by Emma Thompson) first comment of Los Angeles in Saving Mr. Banks, a featherweight cinematic footnote that tries to explore how how her iconic Mary Poppins became a practically perfect in every way confection for Walt Disney Studios.  Travers, in the film,  intends it as a put down, and it's not the first nor the last biting word the author shares throughout the course of the two hour plus film.  As characterized by screenwriters Kelly Marcel and Sue Smith, Travers is a most disagreeable figure-- a harsh, unlikable ninny whose displeasure is squarely aimed at Walt Disney who has the gall to try and seduce the stuffy, refined British harpy into signing away the rights to her beloved creation.  Her fears are that a Disney-fied adaptation would turn her books into a twinkly, sparkly confection devoid of reality, humanity or, as she eloquently puts it, "gravitas."

The cruel joke of the artificially sweetened Saving Mr. Banks is, of course, that Walt Disney did indeed make Mary Poppins and made it into one of his most charming, eternally loved properties-- the 1964 classic remains to this day the only live action film distributed by Disney to be nominated for a Best Picture nomination, and just this last week the film was inducted for preservation by the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress for being "culturally, historically or aesthetically significant."  Take that Mrs. Travers, of which she insists on being called.

Saving Mr. Banks trailer

Saving Mr. Banks - Trailer No. 1

The making of Mary Poppins (incidentally, the first and only picture in which Walt Disney himself earned a Best Picture Oscar nomination) is dramatized in frothy-looking fashion in the first look of John Lee Hancock's (The Blind Side) Saving Mr. Banks, which stars Tom Hanks as Walt Disney and Emma Thompson as Poppins author P.L. Travers.  On first glance, the light inside Hollywood film reads as a Hitchcock meets My Week with Marilyn shrouded in a Finding Neverland literary gloss, packaged as a Disneyland commercial.  Then again, the screenplay was featured in the 2010 Black List of the best unproduced screenplays, so perhaps the first sales pitch is deceiving to project of more heft.

Either way, Disney hopes this December release will be an awards contender on its own right.  The supporting cast includes Rachel Griffiths, Paul Giamatti, Kathy Baker and Jason Schwartzman.