Saving Mr. Banks (2013)

And now for the second film of our double feature, Saving Mr. Banks.

The Movie:

Saving Mr. Banks is a movie about the making of Mary Poppins.  It intertwines the visit of P. L. Travers to the Walt Disney Studios in 1961 with the story of a young Travers, aka Helen Goff, growing up in rural Australia.

While some parts of the story have been dramatized for the sake of storytelling, it is no secret that the production of Mary Poppins was indeed fraught, especially due to the cantankerous nature of the author of the original Mary Poppins books.  The movie cleverly moves between the two stories, helping us to get some insight into Travers and the genesis of her books.

This is one of my favorite movies to come out in the last several years.  As a movie fan, I enjoy seeing a movie about the making of a famous movie.  I also am a big Tom Hanks fan, and he does a nice job in this movie.  As a Disney theme park fan, I enjoy seeing the period recreations of 1961 Disneyland.  And as a musician, I really enjoyed seeing the creation of the original Mary Poppins songs and the score of this movie itself, which utilized music from Mary Poppins plus new material by Oscar-nominated Thomas Newman.

Presence in the Parks:

Well, this movie doesn't have a presence in the parks so much as the parks have a presence in it.  Honestly, my park nostalgia leans more to the east coast than the west (I've only been to Disneyland twice), but it is fun to see familiar elements such as the Mickey flowerbed in front of the train station.

The main park tie-ins would be stuff Mary Poppins related, which was covered in the Mary Poppins entry.  The window with the Mary Poppins premiere honors events that were shown in Saving Mr. Banks, and the movie even gives us a shot of Grauman's Chinese Theater, the building where the Mary Poppins premiere was held and the inspiration for the "weenie" of Hollywood Studios.

The other park tie-in would be through the Sherman Brothers themselves.  As the songwriters for Mary Poppins, they were portrayed in the movie Saving Mr. Banks by Jason Schwartzman and B. J. Novak.  In addition to Mary Poppins, the Sherman Brothers wrote music for many Disney movies, including The Parent Trap, The Jungle Book, Bedknobs and Broomsticks, The Aristocats, The Sword in the Stone, and The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh.  However, some of their best known songs come from the Disney Parks.

Their most famous song is "It's a Small World" from the attraction of the same name.  Other highlights include "One Little Spark" (Journey Into the Imagination), "The Best Time of Your Life" and "There's a Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow" (The Carousel of Progress), and "The Tiki, Tiki, Tiki Room" (The Enchanted Tiki Room).  I'll delve a little more into these attractions in subsequent blogs, especially when a movie ties into them.