Lisa from Boondock Ramblings is doing the Summer of Angela (Lansbury). I'm not going to participate fully because I don't have access to all the movies. I already missed the first one and I'm a few days late with this post because the day was already taken by another post.
Today's movie is Bedknobs and Broomsticks.
You can find Lisa's post on it here.
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| Fair use via Wikimedia Commons |
There are two distinctive memories I connect with this movie from 1971.
The first one is a German TV show for children called "Sport-Spiel-Spannung" (literally "Sports-Game-Suspense"). The "suspense" part was my favorite because they had clips from movies, for example Disney.
I don't know if I imagine this, but it feels as if one particular scene from "Bedknobs and Broomsticks" turned up more than once. I don't think the show had re-runs, so either I did see it more than once because it was very popular or it was just on two or three times and it felt like more to me?
It's also possible that it turned up in Disney shows, however, because I read some people thought it was an animated short film because of that, not part of a feature film.
The second one is that we actually went to see that movie at the cinema which is not something that happened that often at that time. We even got some money to get snacks - those were the times when you could still bring your own snacks unconcealed - and we went to the big grocery store. Choosing was not easy for us, we finally decided on a "Crunch" milk chocolate bar (which disappeared for many years later). I won't name the company because I don't longer buy their products.
Now that you have survived my reminiscing, let's finally get to the movie, shall we?
Let's start with the plot (spoiler alert!). Wait, which plot, though? The original one? The cut version? Or the German cut version? How about the cut version because that's the only one I got to see and then we'll talk about the cuts later on, shall we?
England, 1940.
Three orphans - Charles, Carey, and Paul Rawlins - are evacuated with other children from London to the countryside to escape from German air raids.
All children have already been taken home by families, only the Rawlins children are left when Miss Eglantine Price arrives to pick up a parcel and involuntarily gets tasked with caring for the children.
Things don't start too well. The children don't want to stay in the countryside and Miss Price doesn't have any experience with children.
When the children have gone to sleep, Miss Price unpacks her parcel, a broomstick, sent by "The Emelius Browne Correspondence School for Witchcraft". Unfortunately, the children witness her flying when they set out to go back to London, and Miss Price has to tell them she does a course for witchcraft hoping to help with the war effort. In exchange for their silence, Miss Price puts a travelling spell on a bedknob Paul took off the bed.
When the school announces its closure before she has received the most important spell, Miss Price convinces the children to take the bed to London where they meet Professor Browne. He's a (not very good) street magician who took the lessons from an old book whose last part is still with the bookseller.
Going there, they find out that the important words for the Substituiary Locomotion spell are engraved on a sorcerer's star medallion.
In order to find the medallion, they travel to the island of Naboombu where talking animals live, enchanted by the sorcerer. They find Leonidas, King of the Animals, wearing the star. After a soccer game for which Browne is acting as a referee, he manages to exchange the star for his whistle, and they barely escape the island.
This soccer game is the above mentioned scene, by the way.
At home, they try out the spell to make clothes move, but it ends in chaos.
Professor Browne goes to catch a train back to London, but has to sleep at the station because the last one already left.
Meanwhile, Nazi soldiers have landed on the coast to spread fear of an invasion. They choose Miss Price's house for their headquarters and take her and the children to the old castle.
Browne overhears two of the Nazis and heads back to help Miss Price who then uses the spell on the armors to make them attack the Nazis and chase them off. The plan works. Unfortunately, they also destroy her workroom and thus end her life as a witch.
In the end, Miss Price has adopted the children and Professor Browne has enlisted in the army, but promises with a kiss to be back.
"Bedknobs and Broomsticks" is based on two books by Mary Norton, "The Magic Bedknob; or How to Become a Witch in Ten Easy Lessons" and "Bonfires and Broomsticks" which later got combined into "Bed-Knob and Broomstick".
I read both books after re-watching the movie, and although I don't want to give away details about them now because there might be a post in the future, I can reveal that to me this is a severe case of "how did they get from this to that?".
You may think that "Bedknobs and Broomsticks" is a bit of a "Mary Poppins light". A lady, three children, magic ... but although "Mary Poppins" came out seven years before this movie, the project had actually been older. Disney had bought the rights shortly after the first book was published in 1943, the sequel followed 1947.
When negotiations with P.L. Travers about the rights to "Mary Poppins" took longer than hoped, they started on "Bedknobs and Broomsticks" instead. After acquiring the rights to "Mary Poppins", however, this movie got shelved more than once because of the similarities.
After the movie finally came out, both critics and audience were divided in their opinions. Too long, a mishmash of ideas, not enough heart, inventive, enjoyable, best animation ever, magical, charming, messy, underrated ...
Now I don't remember how much I liked it myself when I was a kid, but I didn't get to see this version, anyway.
The movie originally had a runtime of 141 minutes. I'll be honest, I don't think that was a very good idea for a movie aimed at children first. For its premiere, however, they cut it down by 23 minutes. That's still almost two hours (and the version I watched), still quite long for children.
A lot of people seem to have been confused about Roddy McDowall getting third billing after Angela Lansbury and David Tomlinson. The reason was that they cut out the whole sub-plot showing the vicar at seducing Miss Price to get his hands on her land. Good choice if you ask me. I haven't seen it, mind you, but I can't imagine it doing anything for the plot.
Some years later, they cut it down even more, but I can't tell you what got cut out then. It got a little confusing for me with all the different versions!
So which version did this little German child get to see? Not hard to guess, is it? We didn't have that many scenes with the Nazis here. They got cut out which probably made the ending a bit confusing. There were other scenes that got cut, after all we ended up with only 90 minutes, but the Nazis were probably the biggest part.
I read some forum discussions and I loved how someone said this would have been the chance to talk about history with your kids. Not many people were ready to talk about that kind of history with their young kids in the 70s. That we get to see the full version now, fine, we have learned, but back then history was for school to teach in the first place.
What's interesting to me is how Nazis made it into the movie at all. Not because I'm German and can't take it, but because I read the books.
While the war is mentioned in the first book, the only other mention are butter rations. No Home Guard, no soldiers. No helping with the war effort. The spell is there alright, but for a completely different reason (which could be just as traumatizing, though, but Disney has traumatized me with more than one movie).
I'll say it again, "how did they get from this to that?"
Nevertheless, I enjoyed the movie. I think Lansbury played the aspiring witch (who doesn't look like the stereotype) very well. I liked Tomlinson and the kids were okay.
I agree that the movie was long (I have no interest in watching the even longer version), but it was entertaining. It is a bit dated here and there as was to be expected, and the soccer game may not be quite as exciting as little Cat thought it was, but it was still fun.
My favorite song is "Portobello Road" (despite the accordion), by the way, maybe it is the mix of the melody and the market atmosphere that speaks to me?
Of course the movie gets compared with "Mary Poppins" a lot (they first wanted Julie Andrews as Miss Price, by the way), usually with the result that the latter is so much more brilliant.
I know I'm stepping into dangerous terrain now, but I don't like "Mary Poppins". There, I've said it.
I love the books, but the film is way too long for me and so are some of the songs, and I also think the film very much disneyfied the Mary from the books.
So yes, if you made me choose which one of them to watch for a Disney evening, it would definitely be "Bedknobs and Broomsticks" for me.