Mary Poppins Returns

Fitting that Mary Poppins (Emily Blunt) should return in an age where access to independent art has expanded exponentially.

The options everyone has to express him or herself locally/regionally/nationally/globally, free of charge, have perhaps clouded the master narrative's unconscious lucidity, and made alternative forms of peaceful expression more readily agreeable.

Notably animal videos.

Plus everything's accessible from a magical little device that fits in your pocket and is connected to the world at large.

True, because of this device you can be tracked by who knows who wherever you go, and you may be missing out on a lot of cool real world phenomena if you never lift your head up, but it's also like a cool informative instructive multifaceted tricorder, and if you like brainy stuff too, trust me, there's more than one app for that.

Mary Poppins Returns takes place in the pre-technological era, however, yet still provides fascinating insights into how creative people used to entertain.

Poetic or artistic inspiration isn't limited to the night sky or raccoon encounters you know, it's everywhere you look everywhere you go, as Poppins and Jack (Lin-Manuel Miranda) illuminate, and if you don't forget to observe whatever it is you happen to be caught up in, as you did when you were younger, you can turn a bowl discovered at a thrift shop into Ulysses, or a pinecone into Lost in Translation.

And you can share your observations on Instagram or Twitter or other forms of social media usually without having to make much of an effort.

Like the whole world's gone Barbapapa.

Nevertheless, I was worried when I heard they were making a new Mary Poppins film because the first one was universally adored by so so many, and it's always risky to make a sequel to such cynosures, even 54 years later, unless you dig in quite deep and draft exceptionally well crafted flumes.

Which is what Rob Marshall and his crew have fortunately done.

Mary Poppins Returns is phenomenal, a total must see, even if you don't have children, a celebration of creative minds and the positive effects of imagination, which also critiques zealous desires to foreclose, and lauds the symphonic harmonies of robust labour.

I may actually buy a copy.

Lin-Manuel Miranda and Emily Blunt are outstanding.

It collectively unites song and dance in a coruscating choreographed multidimensional cascading cloudburst, sensually exporting remarkably vivid exceptions while suggesting it's what anyone can do.

Just gotta keep those eyes open.

Draw a parallel.

Infuse.

Juggle.

Into the Woods

Intersecting adventurous clips, securely stashed in a spell; wandering blindly baffling blips, serving to cast off a shell.

The forest provides what the hapless surrenders, riddle me opaque bouquets.

Paths intertwining, confidence rendered, lushly air brushing the haze.

The narrator holds things together.

It's not to be taken seriously, Into the Woods, according to his unconcerned tone, as if, even though the events that take place have paramount repercussions, love, happiness, giants, they're still simply banal and insignificant.

This aspect is captured in the film's focus on preparation as opposed to orchestration, apart from the accumulation of necessities, the land of the giants remaining overtly off limits, the balls Cinderella (Anna Kendrick) attends, never actively showcased.

Brilliant way to save money.

It also explains how easily the Baker (James Corden) and his wife (Emily Blunt) acquire the bizarre knick-knacks they must find, the humdrum coronation of the fantastical, realistically equipped with sensation.

The songs are kind of fun.

Evil is punished, good natures, rewarded.

It wasn't enough to keep me captivated, although I did revel in its mischief.

The middle-class finds salvation.

Paths lined with embowering gold.

Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides

For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.

Femme fatales emerged to watch this creature fair.

Savvy?

The Pirates of the Caribbean franchise continues with its fourth instalment, On Stranger Tides. Its narrative starts fresh, reintroducing old characters and situating them within a redesigned filmscape. It took me awhile to get used to the new cast and storyline, but after examining the retooled schematic, I did enjoy the film superficially, but had problems with some of its internal mechanizations.

The playful dynamics are a lot of fun. Penélope Cruz (Angelica) mischievously stands in for Keira Knightley and her relationship with Captain Jack is somewhat more seductive. The quest for the fountain of youth creates an adventurous mythical dimension which duels with the quadrilogy's first overt religious focus. Captain Jack swashbuckles and alliterates his way through another consistently mercurial performance, attempting to break up would be battles with enumerical misgivings, and trying to ensure that his heroic acts are kept alive as part of an oral tradition. Also enjoyed how Blackbeard (Ian McShane) decides to fight Barbossa thereby flipping fate the bird, and Barbossa's character is strong (after his introduction) and he's given spirited linguistic room to maneuver.

An excuse to eat popcorn from the special edition Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides bucket has been established.

At the same time, the degree to which you must suspend your disbelief at times is troublesome, some of the acting, while encouraged to be either wooden or excessively flamboyant in order to support the narrative's larger-than-life characteristics, is frustrating (notably Richard Griffiths), Blackbeard rarely establishes himself as a captivating focus as his principle strengths are simply being in charge and a magical sword, Scrum's (Stephen Graham) character entertains but doesn't function as a substantial substitute for Pintel, Ragetti, and Cotton, and the harmonies maintained between the competing elements, so smoothly orchestrated by Gore Verbinski in The Curse of the Black Pearl at least, each scene sweetly flowing into the next, are somewhat disjointed as Rob Marshall conducts, and there are occasional pitfalls.

And is On Stranger Tides's narrative supportive of an anti-feminist framework designed exclusively for patriarchal ambitions?

Even though I'm not sure as of yet, you can still cue the hangperson.

You see, independent women are a problem for the patriarchy and it uses its control over manners of representation to vilify them consequently. Thus feminists become amazonian jungle beasts, or, in the case of On Stranger Tides, man-eating mermaids, when depicted by the patriarchy artistically. On patriarchal terms, the women are thought to be obsessed with a stereotypical definition of the male in the same way that the patriarchy is obsessed with the sweet, servile female, and only a man who embodies this stereotypical conception can win their affections.

In On Stranger Tides, the religious figure Philip Swift (Sam Claflin) captures the heart of the mermaid he accidentally helps capture (Syrena played by Astrid Berges-Frisbey), due to the undeniable purity of his own heart.

A mermaid's tear must be placed in one of two chalices and mixed with water from the fountain of youth in order to extend life, the person drinking the chalice with the tear having their life extended by the number of years lived and left to live by the person drinking the tearless chalice.

A mermaid's kiss can revitalize if you ask for her help, meaning, in patriarchal terms, that if you embody the stereotype cherished by the feminist, she can save you if you are fatally injured (how she goes about doing this is unclear), as you will be since your personality destabilizes the chauvinistic ideal supported by the patriarchy (which they seek to convince women to love without question).

Syrena (feminist mythology) kisses Philip (the individual religious figure) after he is fatally wounded. The Spanish (institutionalized religion) destroy the fountain of youth (mythology) around the same time. When religion is institutionalized it becomes capable of destroying its concrete mythological enemies but can never defeat those who embody their pre-institutional ethos who in turn can find refuge in the arms of that which the patriarchy is incapable of destroying, although it attempts to through recourse to belittling manners of representation, its night of the world, as it were.