BURBANK, Calif. — In the coming movie “Saving Mr. Banks,” a comedic drama about the turbulent making of “Mary Poppins” in the 1960s, Walt Disney acts in a very un-Disney way. He slugs back Scotch. He uses a mild curse word. He wheezes because he smokes too much.

The real shocker? Walt Disney Studios made the film.

“Saving Mr. Banks,” which stars Tom Hanks as the mustachioed founder of the Walt Disney Company and Emma Thompson as the cantankerous novelist P. L. Travers, is a small movie that cost less than $35 million to make. But its existence says something big about Disney: despite its well-earned reputation for aggressively managing its image, it can get out of the way and let filmmakers lead.

“Wow, this was so not the battle I anticipated,” said Alison Owen, the independent producer behind “Saving Mr. Banks,” which also pokes fun at Disney’s sometimes-syrupy brand of entertainment. “Disney behaved impeccably.”

Every studio is controlling, but Disney, with its vast merchandise and theme park divisions, has a particular reputation in Hollywood — fairly or not (and the studio argues not) — for having a more narrowly focused and synergistic approach to filmmaking. In recent years the studio has made some headway in courting leading live-action writers and directors, but some still self-edit: Disney will never make this movie, so let’s not even try.