Enchanted Musical Edition
Walt Disney | 1971 | 139 mins. | Rated G
Released in by Disney 1971, Bedknobs and Broomsticks has long been considered by many to be the evil stepsister of 1964’s Mary Poppins. While the similarities are impossible to ignore, Bedknobs and Broomsticks deserves more respect than it receives in many cinema circles. Based on the books The Magic Bed Knob; or, How to Become a Witch in Ten Easy Lessons and Bonfires and Broomsticks by Mary Norton, the musical combines live action and animation and was directed by Robert Stevenson who had directed Mary Poppins and would helm a total of nineteen Disney films in his long career.
The setting is England in 1940. While the citizens of Pepperinge Eye fear an invasion by Nazis and do their part to defend the nation, three young orphan’s need a home to which they can evacuate. “Apprentice witch” Eglantine Price (Angela Lansbury) finds herself forced to take them in—siblings Carrie (Cindy O’Callaghan), Paul (Roy Snart), and Charlie (Ian Weighill). On their first night at Ms. Price’s home, the children find their new caretaker airborne on a broomstick. Soon the truth becomes clear; Ms. Price is secretly taking a correspondence course on how to become a witch.
At the moment, Eglantine’s powers are limited to temporarily turning people into rabbits. But, a twist of a bedknob psychedelically sends her and the kids off to London. There, they find Eglantine’s teacher, Emelius Browne (David Tomlinson), who closed down his school before revealing a very important spell. Shocked to learn that any of his magic actually works, Browne takes his four visitors to the book he’s been copying from, that of a real magician named Astoroth. Browne ends up tagging along as the group go in search of the other half of the “magical spell book.” In the midst of all this, the gang ends up on a magical cartoon island where fish can talk and they can breathe underwater. Miss Price and Mr. Browne win first prize in an underwater dance contest but a giant fishhook pulls the bed and the humans out of the water, among other things.
In truth, it’s nearly impossible to truncate the 140-minute long, plot-thick narrative of Bedknobs and Broomsticks. There’s often several things going on at once, with interesting twists and turns around every corner.
While the animation looks dated when compared to the CG effects of today, Disney did a fabulous job with the visual effects. The combination of live action and animation is pretty stunning for 1971. Without the aid of the myriad of animation programs we have today, I’m sure a lot of pain staking work went into the human/animation interaction scenes. Amazingly though, there are only a few green screen shots that are obvious to the keen viewer. I’ll admit that Bedknobs and Broomsticks is a film I’d like to see on Blu-ray someday, right alongside Mary Poppins.
The musical numbers are sweet and well chosen, not to mention memorable, and the characters are a lot of fun, particularly Lansbury’s Price. Lansbury appears to be having a ball playing the quirky, misguided lead. Heaven knows, the legendary actress knows her way around a musical.
If there is one complaint to levy against Bedknobs and Broomsticks, it’s that it runs too long. The filmmakers could have cut 20-30 minutes out of the film and still effectively told the story. The overly long soccer match is one place that easily could have been significantly shortened. Despite that, Bedknobs and Broomsticks is a delightful film that deserves a place in many home theater collections.
The film is presented in 1.66:1 aspect ratio and “enhanced” for 16×9 televisions. When “Bedknobs” was first released on DVD it was shown at 117 minutes, but even the 139-minute restored version and this Enchanted Musical Edition are lacking the song “A Step in the Right Direction.” They just don’t have the footage. You’ll notice quick jumps that indicate a missing frame or a few flickers of dirt. Other than that, the picture quality is very good. Colors are vivid when they’re supposed to be, and there’s a good amount of detail for a standard-definition release.
The audio is an English or French Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround, but it’s a front-heavy soundtrack. The rear speakers get involved not nearly as much as I would have hoped.. Subtitles are in French and Spanish.
The DVD comes with the following special features:
• The Wizards of Special Effects (7:30) Hosted by Jennifer Stone of The Wizards of Waverly Place, the actress explains how the sodium vapor screen process used on Bedknobs differs from the green screen effects of Waverly Place. Skip it.
• Disney Channel’s Music Magic: The Sherman Brothers (11:27), a retrospective with songwriters Richard and Robert Sherman. They reveal how the project’s seeds were planted with P.L. Travers’ second thoughts about letting Mary Poppins be made and proceed to discuss production with respect to specific Bedknobs songs, including a deleted one. There is also archival behind-the-scenes footage and comments by Angela Lansbury.
• “A Step in the Right Direction” (3:45) is the best way to enjoy this deleted song unless the discarded full footage is ever unearthed. Angela Lansbury’s recording of the song is heard, while a slideshow of still photographs gives us a good idea of how the Lansbury-plus-broom number would have looked.
• “Portobello Road” (1:10) David Tomlinson sings a verse of the song in a recording session.
• Theatrical Trailers: There are four in all.
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