6.5 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 3.5 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
In the latest installment, Nanny McPhee appears at the door of a harried young mother, Mrs. Isabel Green, who is trying to run the family farm while her husband is away at war. But once she's arrived, Nanny McPhee discovers that Mrs. Green's children are fighting a war of their own against two spoiled city cousins who have just moved in and refuse to leave. Relying on everything from a flying motorcycle and a statue that comes to life to a tree-climbing piglet and a baby elephant who turns up in the oddest places, Nanny McPhee uses her magic to teach her mischievous charges five new lessons.
Starring: Emma Thompson, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Rhys Ifans, Maggie Smith, Asa ButterfieldFamily | 100% |
Comedy | 73% |
Fantasy | 50% |
Video codec: VC-1
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 2.40:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.39:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
Spanish: DTS 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
French: DTS 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
English SDH, French, Spanish
50GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
BD-Live
D-Box
Mobile features
Slipcover in original pressing
Region A (B, C untested)
Movie | 3.5 | |
Video | 4.0 | |
Audio | 5.0 | |
Extras | 2.5 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
The not exactly subtle music playing as underscore in one of the short featurettes supplementing Nanny McPhee Returns is The Police’s “Every Little Thing She Does is Magic,” and while that’s a perfect summation of the charms—if that’s the right word—of Nanny McPhee, it also points out the singular dramatic problem with both the original Nanny McPhee film and this sequel (which was titled Nanny McPhee and the Big Bang in the UK). When a character like Nanny McPhee (Emma Thompson) is posited as a woman who can overcome any problem, no matter how farfetched or seemingly insurmountable, is there anything to wonder about, other than how long it’s going to take to get to the all too expected happy ending? I lamented in my review of the first Nanny McPhee that it had everything that money could buy but little of that supposed “magic” which Sting and his cohorts sing about. The results are a little more mixed with Nanny McPhee Returns. The film is still dramatically inert a lot of the time, but it has a major saving grace in the luminous presence of Maggie Gyllenhaal, here playing a sort of distaff mirror version of the widower Colin Firth essayed in the first film. Gyllenhaal portrays Isabel Green, a hard working farm wife whose husband is away fighting World War II. Yes, among other things, Nanny McPhee is either incredibly long-lived or perhaps actually immortal, as the first film was placed squarely in the 19th century (something that turns out to have a nice linking element with this film, something I’ll attempt not to spoil in my review).
Like the first film, Nanny McPhee Returns arrives on Blu-ray with a VC-1 encoded image in 1080p and 2.40:1. And yet this film doesn't look quite as spectacular as the first. That's especially odd in that this film has some glorious shots of the English countryside, and in fact those are the best looking moments of this film, full of beautiful natural light, wonderfully well saturated color and some amazing depth of field. But some of the studio footage looks just a little soft. Don't get alarmed, it's nothing that you're going to scream about, but the sharpness of the first film is simply not present in at least some of Nanny McPhee Returns. Overall, fine detail is quite strong, there doesn't appear to be egregious DNR, and while clarity and sharpness may not rise to the excellent levels of the first installment, they're quite strong in and of themselves.
Nanny McPhee Returns boasts a spectacularly effective lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 mix that is full of some of the magic and whimsy that the film itself only half manages to create. The first thing you'll notice is the absolutely overpowering LFE of Nanny's walking stick making contact with the earth. A circle of sound penetrates over the listener like a huge low frequency wave, moving clearly overhead, and it's a very cool and completely immersive effect. But the film is full of inventive sound design which quite capably utilizes the surrounds, in everything from piglet oinks to the maddening screams of fighting children. The denouement, where the Green's wheat harvest is magically transformed into a variety of sky animals is also accompanied by excellent foley effects which pan nicely through the surrounds. In terms of the "day to day" sound mix, dialogue is clear and crisp, easily heard, and well mixed into the soundfield. James Newton Howard's underscore is also well mixed, never overpowering the dialogue or the sound effects.
Nanny McPhee has a slight but sometimes entertaining array of supplements:
Make no mistake about it, young kids are going to love Nanny McPhee Returns. It's full of poo jokes, synchronized swimming pigs and a rude, burping bird. But the best "family" films need to have something for the adults, too, and on that score, Nanny McPhee Returns is somewhat lacking. This film boasts a stronger emotional pull than the first one did, due largely to the expressive performance of Maggie Gyllenhaal, but when you have actors working within the confines of such a structured format of the McPhee films, there's only so much they can do. Still and all, if you have young kids in need of some harmless fun, Nanny McPhee Returns is Recommended.
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