Tea at Trianon: Mary Poppins Returns (2019)

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Sunday, January 20, 2019

Mary Poppins Returns (2019)

From Nancy Bilyeau:

In 2015 the present film went into development, having received the green light from Travers’ estate. Mary Poppins Returns was directed by Rob Marshall, who is best known for Chicago and Into the Woods. The first film took place before World War One. The story has moved to the 1930s, with grownup Jane Banks (Emily Mortimer) and Michael Banks (Ben Whishaw) living in the old house, but with challenges to deal with.

In the film, little Georgie Banks (Joel Dawson) goes to a park, chasing an old kite carried away by the wind. He grabs the string, and the string pulls him. Before he can be swept off, he is brought down to earth by Jack (Lin-Manuel Miranda), a friendly lamp lighter. Together they reel in Mary Poppins, played by Blunt. “I was flying a kite and it got caught on a nanny!” Georgie declares. (Read more.)

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