Bedknobs and Broomsticks - 2 stars out of 10

Bedknobs and Broomsticks - 2 stars out of 10

"Bedknobs and Broomsticks" is a Mary Poppins-wannabe.  This story may have a leading lady with special powers, a journey to the "underworld" of London (complete with a song to make this group of people very fun and loveable), mischievous young children, David Tomlinson,  and an extended sequence placing live actors into an animated world, but it somehow manages to be TERRIBLE!  For me, the eye-rolling began with the kids.  I don't know how any group of kids could be so unlikeable.  The oldest boy was a little jerk, I don't even remember what the girl looked like, and the youngest was kind of cute but more annoying than anything.  You can feature quality actors like Angela Lansbury and David Tomlinson but if the children are bad, the entire movie is shot.  I feel like they were doomed to begin with, due to the poor quality of the script.  They must have conceptualized Portabello Road while they were working on their designs for EPCOT, since they manage to toss just about every culture into this never ending, 10-minutes long dance number.  And I'm still trying to figure out the purpose of the entire Bookman aspect of the plot, except to make the movie unbearably long.  They easily could've written right past that part and gotten to the animation sooner.  The animated soccer sequence is so good.  The humor is Disney at its finest and the incorporation of live actors into the animation is of the highest quality.  It's just a shame that it exists in the middle of a terribly boring movie.  You can tell that it's the highlight, since this 15-minute sequence dominates the cover of the DVD.  It isn't worth watching this entire movie for the animated sequence, but it's worth looking up on youtube!  The songs can't even redeem this film and if I had to hear that cheesy music while they''re being transported by the bed one more time, I was going to kill somebody.  There are glimmers of Disney movie magic in this film (like the special effects with the armor), but this story is just so dumb that I can't recommend this to anybody, not even once.