Review: Mary Poppins Returns

MaryPoppins Returns

DVD £9.99;

Blu-Ray £14.

Buy at Amazon

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This sequel to the classic family film, originally released in 1964, hit cinemas at the start of the year and will be out on DVD from 15 April. You may remember the original featured some sound advice on personal finance "If you invest your tuppence wisely in the bank/Safe and sound/Soon that tuppence safely invested in the bank/Will compound".

The new film's plot also revolves around financial matters. It's 1936 and Michael Banks (Ben Wishaw), one of the children in the original, is now a widower with three children of his own, and a job as a teller in the bank his father used to work for. However, an unpaid loan means that he and his familyare about to be thrown out onto the streets. Michael is unableto locate his late father's share certificates, and his employer, bank chairman William Wilkins (Colin Firth), is eager to foreclose the future looks bleak.Help is at hand when the eponymous nanny (Emily Blunt) arrives to save the day.

Children and adults alike will enjoy this charming, elegant story, and its tuneful, catchy numbers (though not quite as memorable as in the original).It will also introduce children to some sound personal finance advice, such as the importance of keeping your finances in order and quickly repaying high interest loans (or avoiding them altogether). Certainly, there are several City figures who could learn a thing or two from Mr Dawes Jr when he castigates his nephew Wilkins for enriching the bank's balance sheet at the expense of its reputation.