Movie Review: Nanny McPhee

When President’s Day rolled around and my wife, daughters and I found ourselves with a day off, we decided that we’d go see a movie. The options boiled down to two: Curious George and Nanny McPhee.

At first I was leaning more towards Curious George because it seemed like a light, fun movie and the repulsively ugly makeup Emma Thompson donned seemed very unappealing to me. But as the reviews started rolling in, I began hearing how wonderful Nanny McPhee was. For example, author Orson Scott Card said in his review of the movie, “Don't even think about not going to see Nanny McPhee. If you've been good, then this movie will be your reward. And if you've been naughty -- well, you need Nanny McPhee more than anybody.”

Well, I don’t know if I fit into the naughty or nice category (hopefully nice), but off we went to the show.

Just seeing the premise of the movie as shown in the trailers, one might think that this is simply a retelling of Mary Poppins. Well, it’s not. It only bears the most circumstantial resemblance to its predecessor. I’d say the biggest difference is that this movie actually has a plot. Instead of just a bunch of disjointed adventures laced together with musical numbers and animation—this movie has a grand, touching story arc where all of the characters you come to love throughout the tale actually go through real changes and  learn great, life-changing lessons.

My daughters, ages 6 and 8, both enjoyed this movie immensely as did my wife and I. There was nothing in this movie that was scary—except for a spider that freaked me out more than anyone. There was no embarrassing innuendo that I was hoping either went over my daughter’s heads or that they wouldn’t ask me to explain later. There was never a moment that I felt bored and wished that the movie would move along so we could go home—actually, when it was over, I wished it wasn’t.

Recommend for kids? Yes. There was one part where there was some comical flirtations between the father and a potential wicked-stepmother, but it never crossed the line into anything inappropriate for kids.

Recommend for adults and kids? Yes. Definitely the kind of movie parents won’t mind seeing repeatedly with their kids.

Recommend for adults with no kids? Yes. There was 6 years of our marriage when we didn’t have kids and would go see Disney movies and the like on dates. This is definitely the kind of movie that you don’t need a kid as a chaperone to go see and enjoy. There’s plenty of entertainment in it for all.