That's such an interesting point about 'which you encountered first.' Would I have hated the movie as passionately as I did if I hadn't read the books first?

I dunno. It didn't help that I found the songs as boringly burbly as Muzak, and Dick Van Dyke's weird accent made me cringe. Mostly, though, that world was just so sugary that It felt like a very, very long commercial. Whereas the books were about a magical nanny who could keep kids safe from dark things--a thing I craved as a kid who often felt unsafe.