Robins British and American

 

When preparing my Christmas icons series the other week I googled the robin and found that Americans have a different robin bird to us. More recently I was able to check this out when we had some Americans visiting the house. I showed them one of several cards we had up showing a robin redbreast in the snow. Blank faces. Is it some sort of finch? they asked. I explained.

Then more recently still I took in a good slice of the 1964 film Mary Poppins that people were watching. In the spoonful of sugar scene nesting robins are shown, as  above. They are clearly mechanical birds of some sort but I remember thinking down the years what poor examples they were not resembling any bird I'd ever seen. I now see that they are representations of American robins and not bad. Of course, the very idea that such birds would be seen in London is a gaff and duly noted at the appropriate place on IMDb here.

Six stars for Saving Mr Banks

 

Saw the film Saving Mr Banks this week with Tom Hanks (Walt Disney) and Emma Thompson (P L Travers). I went with Eleri as it was one of those rare moments when we both think we'll like a film and we're able to get round to seeing it. Put simply, it was absolutely stunningly brilliant. This is what films should be like but rarely are - funny, sad, interesting, evocative, nostalgic, simple but compelling, telling a story. It is even worth knowing why it has the title it does.

I do not honestly know whether I have seen a film in the cinema that both made me laugh out loud and quietly cry. It's extremely rare for a film to do even one of those things. When you throw in the fact that it is about a film I know (Mary Poppins) and yet a story that I don't know (the life of P L Travers) then the recipe is a powerful one. I especially loved the moments when the Sherman brothers are writing a song and trying to get it right and because you know how it should go you get a tremendous buzz waiting fro them to work it out.

What was so funny? The hilarious way the Emma Thompson character objects to almost everything that is suggested and treats the co-writers like naughty schoolboys. So sad? Chiefly P L Travers inability to forgive herself but plenty of sadness from Walt and others too.

Seeing this film has convinced me that Gravity was very poor indeed as are most of the films that come out. Almost never do I want to see a film again but this one I would happily see again. I'd also like to watch Mary Poppins again some time.