Nanny McPhee
Whenever I'm asked if there's a genre of movie I dislike, I usually claim to be "open to anything." I'm lying, apparently. Sitting through the first 15 minutes of "Nanny McPhee," I realized I hate movies about bad kids.
Specifically, kids whose dead or divorced parents give them license to terrorize a movie audience. Ultimately, though, the films impart to them a balmy family lesson. "Are We There Yet?" and "Zathura" are that sort of picture. And, to some extent, so is "The Chronicles of Narnia."
"Nanny McPhee" is more of the same, but with a pleasing difference: The children are tortured right back, which makes for a jolly time at the movies.
The Browns -- six insolent monsters and one helpless infant living in the English countryside -- are an obnoxious brood indeed. Since their mother died, they've scared off 17 nannies. Each new conquest is posted on a chart, and the kids' useless mortician father, Cedric (Colin Firth), must go begging for a new one.
Just as the children set about destroying the kitchen and pouncing on my last nerve, the Browns' doorbell rings and in steps Emma Thompson as Nanny McPhee, a severe, stupendously unappetizing woman. She has two warts, a bulbous snout, a blotchy complexion, and one snaggletooth. More crucially, she also has a psycho-killer gleam in her eyes.
With a stamp of her walking stick, the children's pointless horseplay is given a functional hyperactive twist. Vegetables fly violently into a boiling caldron, and Simon (Thomas Sangster), the brood's recalcitrant leader, can't stop maniacally stirring.
Nanny has five lessons of obedience to share, but it won't be easy.
"I never say please," exclaims Simon. Of course, the kids act up for a reason. They're mad that their father never makes time for them because he's obsessed with finding a new wife. They're not the only ones. The family's angelic housekeeper, Evangeline (Kelly MacDonald), has a crush on her boss and can sense the good in his children, which, given their behavior, is impossible, like Superman being able to see through lead.
Cedric has reasons for obsessing over a replacement, mostly owing to a Dickensian arrangement with his aunt-in-law, played by a hawk-nosed Angela Lansbury with a disdain that makes Judi Dench seem warm. Great-Aunt Adelaide has been supporting the Browns and will cut Cedric off unless he remarries. Barring that, she'll take one of his daughters.
The scheme to avoid losing one of the girls and the frantic search for a wife turns up Celia Imrie as an outlandish widow and puts lots of farm critters to work in a way that always leaves kids tickled. Adults, meanwhile, will appreciate the cast's gusto. The child actors are unusually good, much better than the tykes in "Narnia." Derek Jacobi and Patrick Barlow, playing Cedric's co-workers, are the Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum of undertaking. And Imelda Staunton is a riot as the Browns' frazzled cook.
Thompson adapted the screenplay from Christianna Brand's "Nurse Matilda" books, and she and director Kirk Jones balance the slapstick and levity with darker enchantments. At its most enjoyable the film feels like Roald Dahl's idea of "Mary Poppins" -- and on occasion, "The Sound of Music." Who else are the Browns if not a devilish edition of the von Trapps?
I wish Thompson were in more movies. Here she sends up both of Julie Andrews's governess roles, but not heartlessly. Thompson is steely where Andrews was huggable. She's tough because tough is what spoiled kids need. She won't spare them her rod. When her work here is done, I know some kids in Narnia who might deserve her services.
Wesley Morris can be reached at wmorris@globe.com.
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