The horror in 'Relic' has some depth

     If you look at the Australian horror movie Relic as an allegory, it becomes considerably more unnerving than you might expect for a movie with haunted house tropes in its DNA.

     Imagine an aging grandmother who sometimes acts exactly like the grandma to whom everyone in her family has been accustomed -- smart, independent, and feisty. 
     But then there are those other times, the occasions when, for no apparent reason, grandma erupts in fits of irrationally, even becoming violent.

     As you might have surmised by now, grandma suffers from advancing dementia, a condition that's alienating her from her relatives and from herself.
     That's the basic set-up of Relic,  but the movie isn't a medical drama. 
     For most of Relic's economical 89 minutes, first-time director Natalie Erika James walks the fine line between demonic horror and a more realistic terror, the horror of dealing with a demented loved one.

     Fortunately for James, an able cast takes the walk with her. Emily Mortimer portrays Kay. Early on, Kay and her daughter Sam (Bella Heathcote) visit Edna (Robyn Nevin), mother to Kay and grandmother to Sam.

     We're prepared for the worst because the movie's opening already has suggested that Edna is in the grips of something weird and unsettling. When Kay and Sam arrive, Edna is nowhere to be found.

     True to genre form, Edna's house has fallen into disordered decay: badly stained walls, as well as a variety of creaks, groans, and eerily projected sounds. 
     A Post-it note Kay finds reads, "Don't follow it," leaving us to presume that the "it" to which the note refers could be an evil presence that comes and goes, haunting the house as it pleases.

     Marrying familiar horror ploys to psychological tensions between mothers and daughters adds to the effectiveness of James's mysterious brew.

     The movie's ending relies a bit more on horror than psychology but also will leave viewers with something about which to argue. More can’t be said without spoilers.  

     Overall, Relic makes its mark as a superior slice of horror that's eerie enough to give you the jitters, and then there's that sobering allegory: the idea that someone we love suddenly can turn into someone else.

Mary Poppins makes a fine return

Emily Blunt and Lin-Manuel Miranda lead the way in this very belated sequel.

The original Mary Poppins movie — the one starring Dick Van Dyke and Julie Andrews — is so old I hadn’t even graduated from college when it first reached the nation's screens. The year: 1964.

Look, I'd be lying if I told you that I have especially fond memories of the original, which many have come to regard as a classic of their childhoods. I remember taking my then young kids to see it during one of its revivals, considering it a task -- shall we say? -- of obligation and endurance.

Turns out the original had a tipsy spirit and some memorable musical moments. In short, a good time was had by all, even me. I never gave it a second thought nor did I inscribe Mary Poppins in my book of movie memories.

What I'm trying to say is that had no one thought to make a new Mary Poppins movie, you would not have found me rending any garments on gnashing any teeth. I say all this by way of an admission that I'm not an aficionado of all things Poppins.

With all that in mind, on to the new movie, Mary Poppins Returns, which stars Emily Blunt and Lin-Manuel Miranda and has been directed Rob Marshall, still best known for the movie version of the musical, Chicago (2002), which won a best-picture Oscar.

I'd have to say that Return is fine for what it is; i.e., a family-oriented fantasy designed to make its audience feel good or at least better about whatever woes they brought to the theater.

Ben Whishaw plays the now-grown Michael, a widowed artist who's trying to take care of his three kids. He has help from his housekeeper (Julie Walters) and from his sister (Emily Mortimer), a woman with a social conscience. She protests on behalf of downtrodden workers, a category that I presume does not include film critics.

Movies such as Return thrive on melodrama and Mary Poppins Returns digs up one of the hoariest bits of melodrama available. The family is about to lose its believed home to a bank run by a smooth-talking official (Colin Firth) whose behavior ultimately proves (pardon the use of a mildly archaic word) "dastardly."

Meanwhile, the clock ticks. Poor Michael has five days to pay off a loan he's taken on his house. Devastation looms.

Devotees of the first movie will want to know that Van Dyke makes a brief appearance and that the new cast seems largely up to snuff.

Not everyone agrees that Emily Blunt makes a great Mary Poppins, but I found little reason to fault a performance that finds Mary, open umbrella in hand, descending from the sky to help solve the problems of a troubled English family.

In Blunt's hands, Mary dispenses magic with the unadorned simplicity of a cop directing traffic. She has no interest in having anyone question her abilities. She's a kind-hearted drill sergeant of enchantment.

And for my money, Blunt sells what might be the movie's most touching song, The Place Where Lost Things Go.

Miranda's performance as lamp-lighter hinges on his ingratiating and ever-present smile. Miranda, of Hamilton fame, begins the musical parade with a number called Underneath the Lovely London Sky, a sigh of a song and a tone-setter for what's to follow. He also performs one of the movie's more elaborate production numbers, Trip a Little Light Fantastic. It involves multiple bicycles.

Whishaw plays a father mired in undigested grief, the kids are appropriately cute and the musical numbers may make you smile even if they don't prove as memorable as the songs from the original; i.e., tunes such as Chim Chim Cher-ee or A Spoonful of Sugar. The songs for Return were written by Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman (Hairspray).

Marshall knows how to stage production numbers and also makes use of animation in a sequence in which kids take a bath and are transported to the ocean for another musical number. Marshall even includes a show-stopping moment from Meryl Streep, who plays Mary's cousin and who turns her musical number (Turning Turtle) into a memorable comic cameo.

Few of the youngsters who are taken to Returns aren't going to spend much time making comparisons to the original, but they should be able to get lost in the movie's carefully considered production design and an abundantly clear desire to entertain.

A small but intriguing 'Bookshop'

It has taken some time, but Penelope Fitzgerald's 1978 novel, The Bookshop, finally has made it to the screen. Spanish director Isabel Coixet (Learning to Drive) casts Emily Mortimer as a widower who opens a bookstore in an English shore town in 1959. The town's establishment -- led by the smiling but arch-tempered Violet (Patricia Clarkson) -- opposes the shop. Violet wants to see the house where Mortimer's Florence opens her bookstore converted into a local arts center. A reclusive resident (Bill Nighy) emerges as Florence's principal customer. In a role that mixes humor with deep sadness, Nighy creates a memorable portrait of a man whose life is steeped in regret. Mortimer handles her role with pluck and intelligence. Honor Kneafsey appears as the opinionated schoolgirl who earns after-school money as Florence's helper. Florence's support for Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita further annoys Violet, reminding us how controversial that novel was when first published. The Bookshop pays the expected homage to writing, reading and literature, but avoids the trap of becoming a celebration of one woman's dream. Instead, Coixet enfolds the story in a series of betrayals and power moves, all presented without undue melodrama. It may be slightly pejorative to call The Bookshop a little movie, but the label fits; it's small like the seaside town in which its set, but it's far from idyllic in outlook -- and that's its saving grace.

'Party' guests are out for blood

Despite a strong cast, director Sally Potter's arch little movie takes us nowhere we haven't been before.

It concerns me to know that I’ve sometimes felt the way Timothy Spall looks in The Party, a slender black comedy filmed in black-and-white. But even at a shockingly brief one hour and 11 minutes, The Party feels as if it could have been condensed into a 40-minute short as it builds toward a nifty punchline.

Spall, who has never projected so much doom and futility, portrays a British academic whose doctor has given him a fatal diagnosis. Haggard and expressionless, Spall’s Bill seems the personification of pitiless depression.

Joining Spall's Bill in this happily bitter ensemble piece are his wife Janet (Kristin Scott Thomas) and a variety of friends: the catty, mordant April (Patricia Clarkson), her bromide-spouting boyfriend (Bruno Ganz), a coke-snorting financial executive (Cillian Murphy), and a lesbian couple portrayed by Cherry Jones and Emily Mortimer.

The group has gathered to celebrate Janet’s appointment to a ministerial post in the department overseeing Britain's health.

The movie revolves around Albee-style insults that the characters hurl at one another while harboring secrets that will be revealed as the movie builds toward its final surprise.

Part of the trouble with movies such as The Party is that they seem to ask us to feel superior to their embittered, pretentious characters while creating few points of real identification.

Directed by Sally Potter, who also wrote the screenplay, The Party's main thrust -- the celebration that goes terribly wrong -- feels awfully familiar. Clarkson deftly delivers her character’s withering lines and Spall convincingly dangles at the end of his character’s rope, but The Party passes without arriving at a consequential destination.