Saving Mr. Banks
Screening Dates:
Sat 28 December 8:15pm
5pm screening on Sunday 22 December includes The Mistletoe Bough (2 mins, 1904)
Director: John Hancock
Starring: Emma Thompson, Colin Farrell, Tom Hanks
The story of Walt Disney’s battle of wills with British author P. L. Travers over the rights to her novel Mary Poppins makes for an entertaining yet gently nerve-wracking film and the perfect vehicle for a brace of two-time Oscar winners, Tom Hanks and Emma Thompson.
Travers becomes increasingly protective of her fiction, especially when exposed to what Hollywood might have in store for it, but just when she’s about to return home without the much-needed money dangled before her, canny old Walt recognises that something in both of their childhoods might win her around.
With strong support from Jason Schwartzman (Moonrise Kingdom) and B.J. Novak (Inglorious Basterds) as the brothers whose tricksy songwriting horrifies Miss Travers, and Paul Giamatti (Sideways) as Walt’s laconic chauffeur, Hanks and Thompson are a joy to behold.
“SMART, WITTY ENTERTAINMENT. JOB DONE. SPIT SPOT” **** Telegraph
The screening on Sunday 22 December will be accompanied by The Mistletoe Bough, a two-minute gem of a Christmas ghost story from 1904, featuring some early trick photography, and released as part of the BFI’s Gothic season.
Critic: Joe Baltake
Date: 2013-12-25
Publication: Passionate Moviegoer
Quote: John Lee Hancock's unexpectedly powerful 'Saving Mr. Banks' is a surprising discovery
Critic: Gail Pennington
Date: 2013-12-20
Publication: St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Quote: Pencil Thompson in now for an Oscar nomination, and maybe a win, and prepare to leave the theater humming the iconic songs.
Critic: Tom Long
Date: 2013-12-20
Publication: Detroit News
Quote: The sap doesn't run too thick, although it does run, and the movie certainly has a patented Disney upbeat feel much of the time. It's more a spoonful of sugar than medicine for aging baby boomer's souls.
Critic: Steven Rea
Date: 2013-12-20
Publication: Philadelphia Inquirer
Quote: Smart, delightful.
Critic: David Thomson
Date: 2013-12-19
Publication: The New Republic
Quote: Saving Mr Banks is a merciless film. It hits you with every sentimental low blow it can think of. Then it pounds you again. And when you're down, it jumps on you.
Critic: Colin Covert
Date: 2013-12-19
Publication: Minneapolis Star Tribune
Quote: "Saving Mr. Banks" is a shameless wad of corporate PR, a feel-good, self-serving Disney film about the making of a Disney film.
Critic: James Berardinelli
Date: 2013-12-19
Publication: ReelViews
Quote: The movie avoids commonplace traps; it never becomes maudlin and it doesn't transform Travers into a likeable elderly lady whose heart of gold is camouflaged by crotchetiness.
Critic: Chris Vognar
Date: 2013-12-19
Publication: Dallas Morning News
Quote: Beneath Banks' crass self-aggrandizement lies a pretty charming portrait of two overly proud people butting creative heads. Yes, charming. That's what Disney does, and it does it well enough to turn even this condescending pap into something palatable.
Critic: Rene Rodriguez
Date: 2013-12-19
Publication: Miami Herald
Quote: Most people will come away from Saving Mr. Banks feeling like they just sat through a feature-length ad for the magic of Walt Disney, with P.L. Travers' life tacked on as an afterthought.
Critic: Bill Goodykoontz
Date: 2013-12-18
Publication: Arizona Republic
Quote: A good movie, buoyed by good performances from Emma Thompson, Tom Hanks and, almost as an afterthought, an especially affecting Colin Farrell.
Critic: Rex Reed
Date: 2013-12-18
Publication: New York Observer
Quote: The screenplay, by Kelly Marcel and Sue Smith, seamlessly captures two different eras with overlapping story lines that never intrude or confuse.
Critic: Richard Roeper
Date: 2013-12-17
Publication: Richard Roeper.com
Quote: This film works as its own lovingly rendered story.
Critic: Anthony Lane
Date: 2013-12-16
Publication: New Yorker
Quote: Just as Mary rescued the wilting Banks family, so Thompson saves the film. A spoonful of her medicine makes the sugar go down.
Critic: Dana Stevens
Date: 2013-12-13
Publication: Slate
Quote: For a movie that's all about what a swell idea it was to adapt Mary Poppins for the screen, Saving Mr. Banks seems remarkably uninterested in what made the movie special.
Critic: Peter Rainer
Date: 2013-12-13
Publication: Christian Science Monitor
Quote: Thompson is very good at playing imperious, and she even manages an unexpected trace of flirtiness in a few offhanded moments with Hanks.
Critic: David Edelstein
Date: 2013-12-13
Publication: Vulture
Quote: I found it interminable.
Critic: Richard Corliss
Date: 2013-12-13
Publication: TIME Magazine
Quote: The picture finally succeeds as the kind of fantasy that its two main characters consorted in, individually and, on one project, together.
Critic: Stephen Whitty
Date: 2013-12-13
Publication: Newark Star-Ledger
Quote: A desperately Oscar-hungry contrivance whose only hope lies with the terrific Thompson.
Critic: Joe Morgenstern
Date: 2013-12-12
Publication: Wall Street Journal
Quote: "Saving Mr. Banks" wraps a seduction inside a seduction with enjoyable results. It's a Disney film in every sense of the term.
Critic: Moira MacDonald
Date: 2013-12-12
Publication: Seattle Times
Quote: Nobody plays huffy like Thompson, who seems to sniff with her entire body; she's wonderfully funny against Hanks' effusive Disney.
