Updated:
3 February
2006
 
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Adapted from the Nurse
Mathilde stories of children's books by Christianna Brand, Nanny Mc Phee
is a film about a nanny with magical powers. Emma Thompson plays
the title role, Colin Firth, is a recent widower with seven wayward children
whom Nanny McPhee tames with astonishing results.
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General
CommentsAs father of seven of
the naughtiest children in the world, Mr. Brown (Colin Firth) has lost
control. Seventeen nannies have been driven away and he has lost all hope
of ever finding another. But then, one day, a mysterious and magical figure
turns up at the door. Her name is Nanny McPhee. With her bizarre looks
and special powers, it seems that the Brown children may finally have found
their match.
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Trivia
Colin
Firth, Emma Thompson and Thomas Sangster all appeared in Richard Curtis'
film Love Actually. There's even a photo from the screenplay book where
Colin and Thomas are seated next to eachother during the script read through.
Colin
Firth narrates both the beginning and the end of the film
Colin
Firth has an affinity with his non-human co-stars;" Colin actually struck
up a relationship with the spider in the film (Trauma)“We actually met
again a year later and she had forgotten me. She was on another film ‘Nanny
McPhee’, which is a children’s film and is there for very different reasons,
it was either her or her sister. Well they were in the same box anyway”
he laughs. (UK CN 03.09.04)
Nanny
McPhee marks the third film that (Emma)Thompson and (Lindsay) Doran have
made together. Doran also produced Sense and Sensibility, which won the
Academy-Award for Best Adapted Screenplay for Emma Thompson, and was nominated
for six other Academy Awards including Best Picture. Doran also produced
Dead Again, starring Thompson, Kenneth Branagh, and Robin Williams
The
screenplay for Nanny McPhee was written by Emma Thompson and is an adaptation
of the "Nurse Matilda" books, written in the early 1960s by Christianna
Brand. The story has been brought to life by director Kirk Jones, writer
and director of Waking Ned, and producer, Lindsay Doran, who previously
collaborated with Emma Thompson on Sense & Sensibility.
Set
in the late Victorian/early Edwardian England in a small village on the
edge of London, most of the action takes place at the Brown's house which
was built from scratch, along with the surrounding village, on a private
estate in Penn, Buckinghamshire, where filming took place in the summer
of 2004. Some interiors were also built at Pinewood Studios.
Emma
Thompson, the only person to have won Academy Awards for both acting and
writing, also plays the title role, opposite Colin Firth, Kelly McDonald
and Angela Lansbury.
It
is Colin Firth's fourth collaboration with Working Title, having previously
starred in both Bridget Jones movies as well as Love Actually.
Kelly
McDonald, who recently starred as Peter Pan in Marc Forster's Finding Neverland,
joins the cast as Evangeline, the kindly scullery maid
Angela
Lansbury, winner of six Golden Globe Awards and four Tony Awards, makes
a welcome return to the big screen after an absence of two decades.
The
impressive cast also includes Celia Imrie, and Bafta winner, Imelda Staunton.
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Comments
on Colin
"Colin
Firth had always been top of my list", she says." Lindsay Doran, producer
"Colin is probably one of the few actors in our country who combines the capacity for farce and profoundly funny stuff with a capacity for romantic drama." Emma Thompson
Kirk Jones (the Director)
adds, "He was in touch with the broad comedy as well as the sensitivity
of the character. A lot of actors can convey both of these emotions but
few can mix them so effectively."
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Comments
by Colin
While
reading the script, Firth felt like a child being told a story. "Nanny
McPhee has all the elements that you want from a story, that you longed
for in a story when you were a child. You wanted to be a little bit scared,
well, a lot scared; you wanted perhaps to have a bit of romance. It's a
good solid story. It doesn't reverse time; it doesn't go into some impressionistic
zone. It's very funny; it's rather menacing' it has romance and a happy
ending. It really has all those fundamental, very old-fashioned story elements
in abundance, working at a very high pitch. It's the kind of thing that
you hope children are going to sit there watching, wide-eyed, wanting more
of, and I certainly felt that myself."
Playing the father of these naughty children required from Firth a great deal of physical comedy, which he points out is both exhausting and panic-making. "It’s a paradox that the very lightest and silliest stuff is often the most agonizing process in reality," he says. But Firth’s agonies paid off. "He made us all laugh on- and off-set, and delivered a performance which I think is warmer and more comically endearing than anything he has done before," says the director. "Colin was very sensitive to the level of comedy. He pushed the tone when he knew it was needed but insisted on holding back when he felt there was a danger of overkill."
Colin about the part
(hopefully not giving anything important away): "Mr Brown is the embattled
father of seven extremely 
naughty
children and he loves them all to distraction. I think he's a very sentimental
man who wouldn't deny them anything really and because he's recently widowed
it's now incumbent upon him to try and keep order and really to keep his
life on the rails."
Throughout the production
Firth relied on Jones to provide the Nanny McPhee-like centre of calm amidst
the madness of the action. "It's a great strength," says Firth. "Kirk is
uncompromising in getting the shots he wants, yet at the same time very
generous in letting other people's imaginations flourish. If you want to
try something different, he will always allow you to try it, but he's very
determined when he decides the way in which we shoot."
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Reviews
Went
to see a preview of this film today - an excellent film. Can hardly wait
to see it again. Lots of Colin...Here are some thoughts for you. I is difficult
to know what to say without giving the plot away but I will try.
It was a delightful film and I just cannot wait to see it again. Colin (Cedric Brown!!) was in it a great deal and looked - well - as only Colin can. However, I would say as far from Mr Darcy as can be although in one scene he is wearing this fabulous white shirt - very reminiscent of the ones from the Regency period. However, this one is dry!!
Emma Thompson takes on
a markedly different type of literary adaptation in Nanny McPhee, her second
feature-length screenplay (her first was 1995's Sense and Sensibility).
This film is based on a series of children's stories about a witch (masquerading
as a nanny) who is called upon by a widower (played by Colin Firth) to
corral his seven unruly children. There's something about British films,
particularly when they are seen from an American perspective, that makes
them all seem delightfully whimsical. This movie is no exception; the cast
in particular seems highly suited to the task of creating a children's
film that is also highly entertaining to adults. In addition to Firth and
Thompson (who has the title role), Angela Lansbury makes her first appearance
in a live-action film in over twenty years. Though Nanny McPhee is not
as immediately marketable a book franchise as Harry Potter or Lemony Snicket,
the trailer is cute enough that it should attract a good number of kids.
The cast will be a crucial draw for parents, and luckily, they are all
showcased brilliantly here. This definitely looks like an excellent family
film for the fall. www.boxofficeprophets.com
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