Charlie & The Chocolate Factory

[adam]

I adored this movie. Wondrous.

[stimpee]

great review.

[adam]

Fine.

I was somewhat sceptical, going in, for a few reasons, the foremost being that I quite like the original movie. Further, I had become somewhat sceptical of Tim Burton's abilities, since his recent work was not nearly as good as his older stuff (I felt like Big Fish was Burton-Lite). Also, Depp's performance honestly looked a little hammy in the previews.

Now, my opinion should be taken with a grain of salt: I was high on mushrooms, and, when Burton is good, my bias is definitely in his favour.

And this is Burton at his best. This is Burton in the vein of Edward Scissorhands and Beetlejuice, rather than Planet of the Apes and Big Fish. The visuals throughout the whole movie, the set designs, are worth the price of admission alone, in my opinion. From the way the chimney on their shack bends, to the monolithic factory, to the wonderful little room the squirrels sort nuts in, everything looks fabulous.

Some reviews are critical of Depp's performance, but I think they're ill-founded. The comparisons to Michael Jackson are off base, I think, and I wish people would stop repeating them. I've already heard people claim Depp admitted the influence; but I think it's just a lazy comparison encouraged by the current buzz around the trial. I read about what Depp and Burton had decided to bring to the character, and I objected to messing with material that I consider classical. (I was a fan of the books, especially the second, though honestly I hardly remember them at this point.) However, not only is the additional material very entertaining, it adds an angle to the resolution of the story that is fully in the spirit of the original.

This movie is quite funny, and had several moments that had all the adults laughing out loud at lines that were completely lost on the younger crowd. There's some wonderfully dark, hilarious segments, but I don't want to spoil them.

I just loved it. A friend of mine called it Burton's best. I'm not sure, yet, that I agree, but I'm not sure yet that I don't, either.

I don't want to give much away. There's so many good lines, but I'll leave them for you to see. If you've ever liked a Burton movie, you'll enjoy this one, and if you never have, this probably won't change that. But if you were sceptical because of affection for the original, don't fear, I found this to be its own beast, fully enjoyable on its own merits.

[b.miller]

well one thing is for certain. Deep Roy stole the show.


Also, it looked pretty. I found the crowd laughing more than I was but then again they served four glasses of wine in like an hour so... old ladies were giggling everywhere.

the music was also much better.

dont want to harsh anyone's mellow though so i wont go into the negatives.

Deep Roy though, classic.

[adam]

Oh, by all means, brian, go into whatever you desire...I've never seen a thread here where everyone agrees, let's not start now. :)

You're wrong, though.

[b.miller]

eh, my reasons for not really loving it are pretty unfair i guess... It's just that Tim Burton, who used to make movies that i'd see and really be affected by and feel a heart and soul of an outsider struggling to fit in or an idiosyncratic voice that never quite did what i thought it would but invariably take it somewhere better, I now feel is only one step above a hollywood director-for-hire (that step being his art direction, which has somehow become synonymous with directorial style for him). I suppose there's nothing wrong with this movie (see spoiler paragraph if you want my specific grievances), but it doesn't improve on the first movie so much that I'd consider it a permanent replacement and it's certainly not different enough to see it without drawing comparisons. More important to me, however, it didn't do anything special. It's Burton playing to type... This is where the unfair part comes in because i guess that should be fine and it's not like he messed up horribly. Perhaps I feel that he owes me some ingenuity to make up for the last few he's made... as a "return to form" this is not enough.

I dunno, I wouldn't argue with anyone that liked it... I guess I just secretly wanted more and felt let down when all i got were some CG squirrels. I'm sort of hearing a subtext of "he didn't screw it up! that means it's great!" in some of the reviews I'm reading and from people I talk to. In highschool not screwing up meant like a C+, an A meant great. It's my party though and i can cry if i want to. everyone else have a good time :)


SPOILER PARAGRAPH - DON'T READ IF YOU DON'T WANT TO LEARN ABOUT STUFF THAT WASN'T IN THE FIRST MOVIE (Can't remember the books enough to know if they were in there or not).

It also seemed like they replaced every scene where Gene Wilder's Wonka felt emotion or connection with Charilie with a goofball flashback. Now, I'm as much of a fan of Christopher Lee as the next guy, but all of these felt pretty forced and they really telescoped the father/son stuff at the end. I liked Wonka more as an enigmatic figure, I didn't really care to find out any more about him other than he was cool. This also connects to a topic me and Gambit have been discussing via email. i just don't need all that information. They take away from Wonka's cool. So now, instead of a perhaps-all-knowing Wonka who recognizes Charlie's innocence and sincerity, he's a neurotic Wonka who's so out of it that he doesn't really care who he hands his factory to, which I'm less enthused about.

END SPOILERS.

[mmm skyscraper]

as a "return to form" this is not enough.


Do you think Corpse Bride will be?

About the squirrels:

http://www.darkhorizons.com/news05/charlie.php

These aren't CG squirrels though, for much of the time these were real - Zanuck says "We trained 40 squirrels for four months. All squirrels are born at the same time in March, and they were taken right from birth to our little school, so that's all they knew. After that, you have to be careful, because you can't just send them out into the woods because they wouldn't be able to make it. It was amazing that they were able to do what we required them to do... The trainer aged ten years at least during the process until the first shot, because he had never trained squirrels before. He said it was the toughest animal he had to train".

One of the said tricks involved two squirrels simultaneously having to run up and over one of the young child actors which was a tricky feat. The other half of the time the critters are animatronic. On a quick visit to the practical effects house for the film, we saw a bunch of robot squirrels standing around or on sticks with tiny metal claws that look frighteningly real. There was also a giant squirrel eye for one shot involving one of the kids getting a little too close. They weren't the only things that weren't robots - part of the time so were the Oompa Loompas.

[viv]

this came out in the UK this weekend and i really enjoyed it. It had me laughing, flinching (i was slightly scared at some points), and i LOVED the squirrels.
I liked the fact the changed things. I've always felt that because there was a second book, the ending of chocolate factory was pretty anti-climatic. but despite that it was pretty true to the spirit of the book in storyline, diaglogue and characters.

[Animal Boything]

I haven't seen this yet but my brother said he saw a Reuters headline that said "Depp's Chocolate Factory Has Tasty Opening" and we were laughing about that for DAYS.

[lukeyd]

just got back from seeing this. it really really dragged in some points, but other parts were complete genius.

wonka throwing mr salts business card over his shoulder-perfect. the "wooden doll hospital", and the pink sheep that he'd rather not talk about, and the whole 2001 reference - classic.

and yes, deep roy stole the show.

[brokenhanger]

I had 2 big problems with it - big enough to really overshadow everything that was wonderful about it. And there was quite a bit wonderful about it.

The first problem - the girl who played Veruca Salt was terrible. Veruca was always my favorite of the kids, and whoever played her in this one simply wasn't up to snuff. She was a terrible whiner - and since that's was Veruca does, it's quite unfortunate.

Even worse - what the hell was up with the ending? I'll give them putting in the flashbacks and backstory for Wonka [though there was one of those that really didn't make any sense], but the ending was simply atrocious.

I love the book, love the original movie, but I wasn't going into this thinking about how my childhood memories were going to be dirtied. If anyone can make a good Charlie and the Chocolate Factory movie, it'll be Tim Burton. But, goddammit, I fucking hated that ending and as a result won't bother seeing it again.

*Sigh*