If you think your children are misbehaved, check out the Brown children in “Nanny McPhee” released today on DVD.
After his seven children drive away their 17th nanny by making her think they had cooked and eaten their youngest sibling, Mr. Brown (Colin Firth) is desperate to find a replacement. The local nanny agency has closed its doors to the Brown family, and without a nanny the widowed Mr. Brown has no one to take care of his children. Enter Nanny McPhee.
Nanny McPhee isn’t like any other nanny. She doesn’t work for any nanny agency; she instead goes where she is needed, in this case to the Brown’s house. She arrives in the middle of the night one night and immediately begins to get the kids to start behaving, with the help of her magic cane. The cane when tapped on the floor performs magic. For instance one day when the children color their faces and pretend to be sick with the mumps, Nanny McPhee taps her cane on the floor making the children actually have mumps for the day.
Besides the children misbehaving, there is another problem in the Brown household: money. The children’s Aunt Adelaide (Angela Lansbury) has been giving their father an allowance each month to pay the rent at their home and feed and clothe the children. She tells Mr. Brown that if he does not get married by the end of the month, then she will no longer financially support the family, which would mean the children would have to be split up and sent to workhouses, or adopted into other families’ homes. In an attempt to prevent this from happening, Mr. Brown is actively trying to find a wife.
The movie follows the children quest first to get rid of Nanny McPhee, and then to embrace her and her rules. We also get to see Mr.Brown struggle with what to do to keep the money coming into their home, and keep their family together.
The only questionable scene in the movie in my opinion is when the children are trying to drive a prospective stepmother away who has stopped by for tea. In the scene the children try to do things such as put a spider in the prospective step mother’s hair, put worms in her sandwiches, and electrocute her through a doorknob. The children’s father lunges toward her in order to prevent her from being harmed. The woman mistakes his lunging for “affection” and him lunging with something entirely different than her safety in mind.
Overall I think Nanny McPhee is a great movie for the entire family. You and your children will have a lot of fun watching this film, and the children’s antics in trying to drive away both nanny and step-mother prospects. The DVD has several different special features such as:
– How the set was created for the film
– Documentary on the author and illustrator of the original book the movie is based on
– The makeup process to make Emma Thompson into the ugly Nanny McPhee
The DVD is available to rent, as well as purchase from most DVD stores as well as online through Amazon.com