Nanny McPhee (2005)

Wonderful character development!

Captivating movie !

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

This movie feels like it was made purely to piss off people who want good shows

The film should be watched twice. I' m not kidding. First time you see it you take it as a nice fairy tale sometimes funny, sometimes a little sad but still a fairy tale. After watching it for the second time I realized that it tells us very important things. The very first lesson I've learnt is how important, almost vital the role that parents play in their children's life, is. Mr.Brown was so mush absorbed by his grief that he stopped reading bed –time stories to his children, playing cricket with them, talking with Simon. That was the starting point when all the troubles with the children started. It was lesson number ONE. No matter how busy we are, what problems we have, we should always remember about our children, keep an eye on them, care for them. As soon as we stop doing that everything goes wrong. Lesson number TWO. We remember very well how Nanny McPhee looked like when she first appeared in the family: her "potatous" nose , the warts … But in the course of time she became nicer and nicer. It all happened because the children became better and better. At the end of the film we meet a very nice, slender woman who has nothing to do with Nanny McPhee we met in the beginning. What is the lesson? Very much in our life depends on ourselves and people around us. The worse and uglier they are the uglier we ourselves become. My conclusion? Be kind, friendly, understanding, sympathizing , and there will be no "warts" around you. PS. I was quite disappointed when in one of the interviews I read that Mr. C. Firth felt ashamed of his part in the film. He wouldn't like his sons to see him running, jumping and all that. What was wrong about that? It sounded to me somewhat "snobbish". Or I must have misunderstood what he said. Did I?

The strongest aspect of NM is the visual quality, into which valiant effort must have gone. Well done. However, as determined as the filmmakers must have been in trying to make this predictable kiddie-movie formula film look great, they were even more ambitious in one thing: trying to make Angela Lansbury look worse than she already does.And I'm not just taking cheap shots at her three-digit age (she's like Lauren Bacall: immortal). The point is that she'd always looked hideous. (That's nepotism for ya.) Which begs the obvious conclusion: sticking a large nose onto Lansbury is an utterly unnecessary act of sheer overkill. Futile; sort of like the reverse of trying to make a cockroach look sexy by giving it breast implants.I could be similarly nasty about Emma Thompson. When her warts and the tooth are gone, do we really see much of an improvement? Hardly a face to fall in love with - unless your name is Ken and you make dull Shakespeare adaptations (for lazy O-Level students) for a living. She also wrote the screenplay, based on some kids' books, and that must have been one helluva feat, huh? Even Madonna managed to put a few sentences together when she released her bin-worthy drivel. (Although, to be fair, when it comes to the Immaterial (Kabbalah, remember) Girl I'll just have to give her the non-benefit of a doubt and assume that she hired a ghost writer even for that.)Colin Firth... Well, Firth is his usual self. Has he ever played anyone else - besides himself I mean? Still, the English understatement, combined with the stereotypical lack of confidence, suited the movie well.Some adults were unnecessarily harsh with their comments and ratings with this movie. They consider it to be too predictable and childish. Well, duh: it's a movie for kids, not adults. What did they expect, "The Usual Suspects"?

Nanny McPhee is a film I wouldn't normally touch with a 4-metre barge pole. The plot of a magical nanny sounds like a steal from Mary Poppins (which it is), and pie fights and dancing donkeys didn't exactly build a strong case for the film. Until I learned it was written by and starred Emma Thompson.Emma Thompson is one of my favourite British actresses. What I love about her is the way she is so untouched by celebrity. She never puts on airs. She is so down to earth and is yet possessed of a sharp, sophisticated wit. In everything I see her in, she never fails to steal the show. You could be seated next to her on a plane, carry on a conversation and enjoy it. And she would enjoy talking to you. (As long as it was about something interesting!).It's always a joy to see her in something, but even more of a joy to see something she's written. Emma Thompson's witty, ironic prose works well on the big screen. She won a well deserved Oscar for Sense and Sensibility, a surprisingly funny account of the opposing classes. But one wishes writing is something she would return to more often. Its something she doesn't do nearly enough of. Nanny McPhee is her first proper screenplay since Sense and Sensibility. Adapted from the Nurse Matilda books by Christianna Brand, and playing the title role, its something she's tailored to her specifications.Nanny McPhee comes to oversee the seven unruly Brown children. Their father Mr Brown (Colin Firth) hasn't been able to keep the family together since they're mother died. They've driven away 17 nannies (like another Julie Andrews vehicle I know), and Mr Brown is at his wits end. That changes when Nanny McPhee arrives. With her bulbous nose, overhanging tooth and warts and all, Nanny McPhee is the type of nanny Rosemary might hire for her baby. Her credo is simple:"When you need me but don't want me, that's when I will stay. When you want me, but no longer need me, that's when I must go."She slowly works her magic over the Brown household. She whips the kids into shape, teaching them lessons about responsibility and common courtesy along the way. She plays matchmaker between Mr Brown and the household's lovely scullery maid, Evangeline (the radiant Kelly Macdonald). But the dastardly Aunt Adelaide (a magnificent Angela Lansbury) has her own plans.Nanny McPhee is not a perfect film. At its most generic level, it is a ripoff of Mary Poppins, (we even get to see the kids flying kites at one point) but a Mary Poppins reworked through Roald Dahl. Nanny McPhee is a film that might have worked better were it released through a British company instead of Universal. This is just a personal opinion, but I feel British films released through American studios tend to lose a lot of their bite. Its a problem that particularly crippled Love Actually.Quite a few actors from Love Actually crop up in Nanny McPhee. Aside from Emma Thompson and Colin Firth, there is the young and immensely talented Thomas Sangster, and Adam Godley in a small role of a vicar. There is a bit of novelty in actors from disparate story lines of Love Actually all sharing the same one this time.Because its released through Universal Studios, it means that there are a lot of special effects in the film. I really hated the dancing donkey. Have I already mentioned that? And some of the sets are so overdesigned they begin to wear on the eyes after a while. But the film's one major asset is the always delightful Emma Thompson.Thompson carries herself with a mystery and arch drollery that keeps you continually involved. Even when the film threatens to get into some sticky areas along the way, Thompson's magical presence is always a hook. Even buried under tons of makeup, her vibrant, bubbly persona shines right through it. One of the film's more unusual touches is the way she sheds some of her ugliness whenever she teaches the kids a new lesson. By the end of the film, she becomes the beauty she's tried to bring out in the people around her.Thompson's clout in the industry has allowed her to share the screen with a really excellent cast. Thankfully, unlike Love Actually, there are no Americans. And none of they're colloquialisms either. Colin Firth is OK, but he doesn't get much to do except feign exasperation. But the rest of the cast is superb. The sweetly appealing Kelly Macdonald is great, two years before her surprisingly convincing performance in the excellent No Country For Old Men. She's a whiz with accents. Going from a working class scullery maid to an upper class, proper lady with utter conviction.We also have Imelda Staunton as the Brown's no-nonsense, military in mind cook Mrs Blatherwick. With her rosy cheeks, chin and forehead, she looks like she's about to die of terminal rosacea. Celia Imrie is hilarious as Mrs Quickly, the strumpet of ample bosoms with an eye on the Brown family fortune. Her facial expressions are as distracting as her cleavage. We also have Derek Jacobi and Patrick Barlow as a couple of prancing dandy's. But its Angela Lansbury who really shines as the perfectly horrid Aunt Adelaide. With her beady eyes, hook nose and clipped elocution, she's the only one in the cast who can keep up with Emma Thompson.Director Kirk Jones sometimes mismanages things, allowing the comedy to topple into slapstick farce. The early scenes with the kids are just noisy. And the wedding climax's cake throwing and imagined bees is just plain silly. The film is at its best when Nanny McPhee is quietly pulling the strings from the shadows. It ends predictably, but the welcome presence of Emma Thompson ensures it passes the time pleasingly enough.

I really really had a good time watching this film, just exactly what I needed to escape a bit exactly what movies used to be when I was a child. Some will say it's way too predictable but some It's not a movie aiming at delivering a high level of suspense. It's a good tale with some wise moments. I especially like the parts when Nanny McPhee let the children take their own decisions and warn them about the consequences. I personally find this in real life to be an extraordinary way of dealing with children. The filming and set are beautiful (though I found the colors way too loud) and some moments are really funny exactly the sort of things children candidly laugh at (tricks played by the children, food fight). The thing I didn't like so much is that the relationship between Mr Brown and Evangeline is not really developed in the first part of the movie. He doesn't even seem to show any interest in her whatsoever. Even though we know from the start they'll get married at the end, it's kind of abrupt when they declare their love to each other. Small children will like this film as well as any grown up who's got a good dose of nostalgia and who kept one's child's spirit.