'Nanny McPhee Returns': Emma Thompson is back to work her magic

MOVIE REVIEW

Turns out that Nanny McPhee, that magical domestic played by Emma Thompson, can time-travel — and who would doubt it? "Nanny McPhee Returns," a charming family film written by Thompson and directed by Susanna White, takes us to World War II-era England, perhaps half a century later than the setting of the previous film, "Nanny McPhee." It's a ripe era for children's literature; I could swear, in one London scene, that we got a glimpse of the Pevensies from C.S. Lewis' "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe."

Perhaps they'd have enjoyed having a magic nanny, too. As in the previous film, Nanny McPhee is dispatched to help a family in desperate need of order. Isabel Green (Maggie Gyllenhaal) lives with her three children on a rundown family farm in the countryside. Her husband, Rory, is fighting overseas, and poor Isabel must cope with a shiftless brother-in-law (Rhys Ifans) determined to make her sell the farm, a part-time job with a comically absent-minded shopkeeper (Maggie Smith), and the arrival of two more children: posh cousins Cyril (Eros Vlahos) and Celia (Rosie Taylor-Ritson), sent from London for safety but creating havoc as soon as they arrive.

Nanny McPhee, who introduces herself to a surprised Isabel as an "army nanny," soon sorts things out nicely with a few raps of her ever- present stick (and some help from an ever-belching bird), gradually endearing herself to the family as she does so. She's no scene-stealing Mary Poppins, but very much a background figure, quietly using magic to help the children realize what's right. And Thompson keeps the character still and mysterious, hiding her secrets behind that snaggletoothed half-smile.

Gyllenhaal, though an unusual casting choice in this very British movie, is utterly charming; her perpetually smiling Isabel wafts through the disorder of her life as if she's floating in some floral-scented haven above it. She is, nonetheless, a proper British mum: In crisis, she immediately announces that she's putting the kettle on. Toss in five personality-laden children, all equipped with excellent verbal skills courtesy of Thompson ("You look like a banana"; "You look like an unraveled toilet roll"), a visiting baby elephant, and some synchronized-swimming pigs seemingly fresh from a Busby Berkeley movie, and you've got a delightful way to amuse kids needing distraction before school starts. "I had no idea pigs could swim so stylishly!" enthuses Celia. May Nanny McPhee return again, very soon.

Moira Macdonald: 206-464-2725 or mmacdonald@seattletimes.com