Though it's set in a stylised version of the 1940s, Nanny McPhee and the Big Bang is supposed to be all about us. The director, Susanna White, sees Maggie Gyllenhaal's juggling and harassed single mum as "such a contemporary figure". The father of her unruly brood happens to be away at the front, but White says: "I wanted the absent dad to feel universal."
Doubtless many a fraught lone parent will indeed see something of her own plight in Mrs Green's travails. Whether the way in which they're resolved will bring her much comfort is another matter.
The torrent of conflicting guidance to which mothers shouting vainly at fractious children are subjected seems to have little effect, except perhaps in making them feel that their failure is their own fault. Many of them might welcome the arrival of a state-funded supernanny armed with a sure-fire means of imposing domestic order. Certainly, Nanny McPhee's five-point programme ought to be of interest, purporting as it does to make selfless paragons out of selfish brats.
It certainly succeeds in sorting out Mrs Green's bothersome youngsters. Lesson two teaches them to share, lesson three to help each other, lesson four to be brave and lesson five to have faith. However, all of these triumphs depend on the effectiveness of the first lesson, which has to overcome initial childish recalcitrance. Until this has been learned, further progress is impossible.
Yet it's here that Mrs Green's real-life counterparts may be disappointed. To achieve her goal, Nanny McPhee requires the use of a magic walking stick. Sadly, this is an item not available to today's troubled mums. The spell that the stick is called upon to cast proves even more dispiriting. To correct their unseemly behaviour, the wayward babes get their heads preternaturally battered against walls and floorboards.
Though this procedure seems to do the trick, a latter-day Mrs Green who emulated it could surely expect to hear from social services. So, in what's an otherwise saccharine family movie, why have Ms White and writer Emma Thompson felt obliged to endorse such tactics? Mary Poppins was no soft touch, yet she didn't stoop to naked brutality.
Unconditional love
Mary, however, was dealing with a household that did have a dad, and one who brooked no nonsense. It was a deficit of affection that she had to tackle, not of discipline. Nowadays, we seem to have the opposite problem. Parental love must be unconditional. Even if there's a dad available, children no longer need fear the warning, "You just wait until your father gets home." Today's parents are expected to enforce their authority without effective sanctions against its defiance.
Told to set boundaries they're unable to police, they depend on their offspring's goodwill. Yet devilry is part of infancy. Children can be forgiven for giving rein to it if they know there'll be no really troubling consequences. Hence Nanny McPhee's reliance on force. Hence too, the wistfulness this may inspire in some cinema-going mums who'd no more dare to smack a sprog than smother it.
It's not just parents who've cause to ponder Nanny McPhee's first lesson. Once, the whole community used to share the task of controlling troublesome youngsters.
Obviously, our offspring need love. We've come to believe that showing it precludes instilling fear. Maybe it does, but Nanny McPhee thinks not. She speaks softly, but carries a big stick. The first Nanny McPhee film carried the tagline "Behave or beware". This one's is "The magic is back". Perhaps the magic's simpler than it seems.
Don't miss it
Nanny McPhee will be released in cinemas across the UAE today.
