Alma Lawton Movies

Long resistant to film adaptations of her Mary Poppins books, P.L. Travers finally succumbed to the entreaties of Walt Disney, and the result is often considered the finest of Disney's personally supervised films. The Travers stories are bundled together to tell the story of the Edwardian-era British Banks family: the banker father (David Tomlinson), suffragette mother (Glynis Johns), and the two "impossible" children (Karen Dotrice and Matthew Garber). The kids get the attention of their all-business father by bedevilling every new nanny in the Banks household. Whem Mr. Banks advertises conventionally for another nanny, the kids compose their own ad, asking for someone with a little kindness and imagination. Mary Poppins (Julie Andrews in her screen debut) answers the children's ad by arriving at the Banks home from the skies, parachuting downward with her umbrella. She immediately endears herself to the children. The next day they meet Mary's old chum Bert (Dick Van Dyke), currently employed as a sidewalk artist. Mary, Bert, and the children hop into one of Bert's chalk drawings and learn the nonsense song "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" in a cartoon countryside. Later, they pay a visit to Bert's Uncle Albert (Ed Wynn), who laughs so hard that he floats to the ceiling. Mr. Banks is pleased that his children are behaving better, but he's not happy with their fantastic stories. To show the children what the real world is like, he takes them to his bank. A series of disasters follow which result in his being fired from his job. Mary Poppins' role in all this leads to some moments when it is possible to fear that all her good work will be undone, but like the magical being she is, all her "mistakes" lead to a happy result by the end of the film. In 2001, Mary Poppins was rereleased in a special "sing-along" edition with subtitles added to the musical numbers so audiences could join in with the onscreen vocalists. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

In 19th century England, the authorities are baffled by the incredible good luck of condemned prisoner John Marriott (Alfred Ryder). Every time Marriott is brought to the gallows, some accident or other occurs and his life is spared. Laughing contemptuously, Marriott tells his captors that no one will ever be able to hang him. It seems that he has already had a vision of his death, and he knows that he can only meet his doom at the feet of a lion--and there aren't too many lions in the British Isles (or are there?) ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Olivia de Havilland and Richard Burton star in this adaptation of Daphne du Maurier's gothic novel. In a reversal of Jane Eyre, it is the hero who arrives at the home of a mysterious woman. Rachel (de Havilland) is the widow of a Cornish man of property (John Sutton), who died in suspicious circumstances. Philip Ashley Burton is the dead man's cousin, who in probing his relative's demise immediately suspects Rachel -- and goes on suspecting her even after he falls in love with her. Going against the inheritance laws of the era, Burton turns over his cousin's estate to Rachel, but she refuses his entreaties of marriage. He soon falls ill, and it is whispered that Rachel has poisoned him. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi