Beyond the cringe

That which is loved is always beautiful, goes the old Norwegian proverb. But Nanny McPhee (Emma Thompson) looks at first to be the exception to the rule.

When she arrives at the Victorian household of widower Mr Brown (Colin Firth), an undertaker's assistant whose children have driven away 17 nannies, she's enough to scare this critic, let alone the kids.

Swathed in black, and proclaiming herself a government nanny, she has a bulbous nose, two nasty warts and a front tooth that sticks out of her mouth as though it can't stand her breath.

But she has kind eyes which seem to gainsay the tough way she deals with the kids and, slowly but surely, she teaches them manners. Gradually, too she becomes a bit more like the Emma we know and love, as if the more the children like her, the more her looks are transcended.

Meanwhile, poor Mr Firth has a terrible dilemma. He needs to marry within a month or his imperious aristo aunt (Angela Lansbury) will stop the money she gives him to support the brood. The only woman he can find is the ghastly Mrs Quickley (Celia Imrie), but he's actually in love, though he doesn't know it, with the pretty scullery maid (Kelly Macdonald).

Written by Thompson, directed by Kirk Jones, who made Waking Ned, and taken from Christianna Brand's Nurse Matilda Goes to Town, the film is a throwback to a kinder age with special effects knobs on.

It has an old-fashioned enthusiasm but lacks the charm that made The Railway Children, for instance, such a perennial favourite.

And the good cast, which has Thomas Sangster playing the leader of the brood, Imelda Staunton as cook and Derek Jacobi, rather thrown away in a tiny part, are straining a little at times.

While children will love it, something is missing. I fear it is played too much as grotesque farce and too little as charming fantasy. It makes you wonder exactly what it's trying to do, and to whom.

Nanny McPhee
Cert: U