I’ve got all this time on my hands, so I decided to watch through the 100 Best Musical Movies of All Time, as rated by Rotten Tomatoes. I already have qualms with this list, because #100 is Bedknobs and Broomsticks, and I unironically love this musical, go ahead and fight me. When I was a child, my sister and I would watch this movie all the time, on my parent’s brass bed, and pretend we were travelling along with them. I tried unscrewing the knobs off their bed, too, along with every nut holding the thing together. My mother was not pleased.
Since I own this on blu-ray, it was easy to track down and watch again for the like hundredth enjoyable time.
The case for Bedknobs and Broomsticks being one of the BEST musicals of all time:
1. This musical is set during one of the most fucking dark times of human history, and it does this strange thing of presenting the harsh reality of the war contrasted with the struggle of trying to maintain some type of normalcy when everything is going to shit. It takes place during World War 2 during the invasion of England, and the first scene is of a man painting over the street signs so the Nazis would get lost. Miss Price (Angela Lansbury), a satisfied single woman living her best kid-free life in a house on the countryside, is training to be a witch through a correspondence course, so she can use her powers to help the war effort. She is forced to house 3 children from London to keep them safe while Nazis are literally bombing the city. In fact, later in the movie, they travel to London (via bed, because of course), and they find out that the man Miss Price has been corresponding with, Mr. Browne, is squatting in an abandoned mansion because there is an unexploded bomb in the front yard. And if that wasn’t enough, in the climax of the film, all the main characters chase off invading Nazis with enchanted suits of armor. As a child, this whole scene was so unbelievably creepy to me – moving suits of armor that are completely hollow inside swinging medieval weapons at Nazi solders. It felt like zombies were marching across the fields and I still love it. What kind of kids movie does this?!
I know what you’re thinking, and no, the Sound of Music does not do this. It’s all “my dad might bang my nanny!” and “my boyfriend might be a National Socialist” until they have to run from the Nazis at the end. Literally everything in Bedknobs and Broomsticks comes as a result of the war.
2. The songs are fire. You cannot tell me that once you hear “Eglantine”, or “Substitutiary Locomotion”, that they won’t be stuck in your head the rest of the day. Not to mention “The Beautiful Briny Sea” is just a fun green screen romp with a bunch of animated fish. Watching Miss Price and Mr. Browne dance on the sea floor cracks me up every single time. The way Angela Lansbury paddles her little feet, it kills me.
Angela Lansbury is just a musical treasure, I love her so much.
Does the movie use the musical numbers in a unique or groundbreaking way? No, but I think that’s fine. I don’t even mind when they introduced the “Portobello Road” number to clearly stretch the runtime of the movie, because it’s just fun to watch. The only song I could live without is “The Age of Not Believing”, because it’s nothing special, and does nothing to move the plot forward or entertain anybody. Charlie’s inability to believe in magical things starts and ends with the song.
3. For 1971 special effects, it’s extremely charming. I like that they’re on a strange acid trip when the bed travels, and it sparkles as it disappears and reappears. Same with the never ending parade of people and animals Miss Price turns into rabbits. As a kid, I could not, for the life of me, figure out how all these objects just moved by themselves. They gave empty suits of armor personalities when they were, you know, fighting Nazis. When they all deflate like bagpipes at the end :chefs kiss:
The mix of live action and animation is satisfactory, although I could live without the entire soccer game. The fact they call it soccer when it takes place in England is just so bizarre to me. The uselessness of this scene is only highlighted later on in the movie, when you find out they didn’t need to go there in the first place.
4. I think this movie doesn’t get the credit its due because it will forever live in the shadow of Mary Poppins. While there are similarities in the premise of a magical woman taking care of children that aren’t hers (and they happen to take a trip to an animated magical land where animals dance), the core of the movie is much different. Instead of a magical nanny bringing a family back together, it’s about learning to create your own family, even in the most dire of circumstances. Miss Price and Mr. Browne were not intending to become parents, and were content on hacking it on their own, but throughout the film they discovered that human connections were something they wanted, and it was more important to maintain those than their own selfish pursuits. Bedknobs and Broomsticks is about a group of strangers learning how to make meaningful and supportive connections with each other, and I think that’s adorable.
Oh, and it’s also about kicking Nazis.
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