Set 25 years after the original, Returns sees Mary Poppins (Emily Blunt)…well, returning…to once again guide the now-adult Banks children Michael (Ben Whishaw) and Jane (Emily Mortimer).
Six years is a long time in many ways. For technology, it’s practically a century in terms of the innovations that can happen. For cinema, it’s almost as long sometimes, especially where a sequel is concerned. Wait too long, and you run the risk of the original losing relevancy.
At one point during A Wrinkle In Time, the film adaptation of Madeleine L’Engle’s beloved and award-winning sci-fi/fantasy magnum opus, the eccentric Mrs. Whatsit (Reese Witherspoon) gives heroine Meg Murry (Storm Reid) the gift of all her faults. While the line is clearly not meant metatextually — indeed metatext is almost non-existent throughout the film — one’s enjoyment of Ava DuVernay’s ambitious and colorful but strangely muted take on L’Engle’s classic relies almost entirely on the viewer’s ability to embrace the film and all its flaws.