Here’s a brief trip that I thoroughly believe in:
nn
The elaborate rooftop chimney sweep dance in “Mary Poppins” always moves me more than something in a cartoonish movie should. There is so much to it, both as a number in itself and how it blows away all the pretenses of reality for a few moments. It emerges and just as abruptly disappears like some 100 year blooming desert flower. It is the joyful revolution always just beneath the surface of the deadening System.n
n
See also where Michael refuses to invest his tuppence in the bank (and ends up buying material to make and fly a kite). It is a revolutionary moment in a very small act. The whole staid banking system comes down (and comes down on him).
nn
Even now Utopia can break through in the unlikeliest of places, however briefly.n
n
I read somewhere about an academic complaining about the Captain’s use of the word “hottentots”. That missed the point entirely. The Empire was coming down, joy was breaking through.