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Underground > Film, TV & Theatre >

Burton/Depp's CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY

  
  

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Professor Silly
15:07 / 18.07.05
Ditto on finding it hard to make out the lyrics in the songs--I'm really looking forward to a DVD (so I can have the subtitles to help).

Otherwise I thoroughly enjoyed my time in the theater with this one: giggling throughout I left feeling light as air!
 
 
archim3des
18:26 / 21.07.05
i fucking loved it.

I never really fell for the original Wonka movie, though I did love the book.

Though there where certain points where I really didn't care very much for what was going on in the actual scene the environments where so rich and... involved that they where fun to watch as well.
Not to mention all of the wonderful adult/drug humor/innuendos ("Now kids even though the oompa-loompas love their cocoa nuts, beware of eating to many or you'll nose will start to itch"), and you have to love grown adults devouring a 7 foot tall mushroom.
At certain points Depp/Burton made Wonka a character all their own, in ways Wilder never did. I mean, at certain points in the movie the man was positively insane, like when he greeted the Kids at the gate, and not knowing what to say his first statement to them is "Happy Bluebirds", and then realizing that they wouldn't possibly understand him, he pulls out those little cards and starts to read from them. Throughout most of the film, he displays neurotically antisocial behavior bordering on autism, and for me that hit a soft spot. I can't count how many times in a day people will try to communicate with me, and I have no idea how to respond, and conversation cards come easily to mind to describe my automated reactions.

coincidentally, i watched an interview with burton on slash/dot about several of his drug innuendos in the movie, and the only thing he really talks about is the scholastic depth he attached to chocolate throughout the movie. he mentioned how chocolate(xocolatl) was used ritually by mayans in a variety of their religico-magical rituals, as offering, drink, and incense. His specific mentioning of that instance was when during one of his flashbacks, his father throws a basket of candy into the already burning fireplace, and as soon as the candy enters the flame, it begins to burn an irridescent blue, and then the flashback to the scene at hand was the point where they where shooting down the river of chocolate and all of the oompa-loompas where wearing blue as well. I haven't checked up on this so it might be a dubious bit of info, but Burton said that chocolate burns a blue smoke, and for the Maya this was considered a blue bridge between the faithful and the deity petitioned.

all in all i fucking loved it, and will definitely go and see it again before its out of theaters, but this time I might just do it sober.

If these sort of remakes are what are in store for the future, I can't wait to see the remake of the "Phantom Tollbooth".
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
21:50 / 05.08.05
I thought it was absolutely ace.

I must admit, I had issues with the constant references to "candy" and "dollars"... for fuck's sake, when the lady in the shop offers him $200 for the ticket, shouldn't the obvious response have been "but what would I do with $200? It's not even legal tender here!!!" But those were minor points.

I also admit I'd probably have had more of a problem with the whole "WW's dad" thing, had it not been Christopher Lee. But it was, so I didn't.

And it further advances my theory that Johnny Depp can play absolutely ANYONE... even (and this is the weird bit) a Michael Jackson analogue WHO HATES CHILDREN.

I was more relieved than disappointed that Mr Burton didn't go for it on the boat ride scene, largely because I think that's one part of "the other movie" that couldn't be made any better.

Overall, I thought it was a wonderful movie. As a Tim Burton fan, I thought it did all the things a Tim Burton movie of CATCF should do, and it did them damn well. Of all his movies, it reminded me most of Edward Scissorhands (even down to having a legendary horror actor playing the father) which, to me, is a good thing.
 
 
Cat Chant
14:50 / 06.08.05
Of all his movies, it reminded me most of Edward Scissorhands

Oh, me too. To the extent that I couldn't really see the point of this movie, because Edward Scissorhands is the Tim Burton version of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - I mean, the ways in which CatCF has influenced Tim Burton show to their greatest effect in Edward Scissorhands, and this movie was just... illustration. (Literally: a lot of the visuals reminded me very strongly of the illustrations from the edition I read when I was little, especially Violet Beauregard turning into a blueberry and Verruca Salt getting thrown away by the squirrels: did anyone else get that?)

The problem with Burton turning Wonka into a whispery, eyes-cast-down femme is that it doesn't leave anything to do with Charlie (already a whispery, eyes-cast-down femme), who becomes even more boring and cipher-esque in the film than he is in the book, since the only difference left between him and Wonka is charisma. Tangent and I were rooting for Wonka to choose Mike Teevee - he's a fiery little butch with an active curiosity about the workings of the chocolate factory and an insatiable desire for technological innovation which matches Wonka's own! They'd be a much better pair! Apart from Wonka-Dahl's inexplicable hatred of television - which I think by 2005 is dated enough to need a little bit more contextualization, especially in a movie which is concerned to explain why Wonka hates families (much more explicable than why he hates television, surely?) - there was no conceivable reason for choosing bland little Charlie over tough little Mike.

My favourite thing about the movie was, of course, the fact that Deep Roy - the voice of Moloch and the actor who played the Klute and the Chief Decima in Blake's 7 - was ALL THE OOMPA-LOOMPAS. Actually, the Oompa-Loompas were pretty good altogether - after a terrifyingly colonialist/racist origin myth* which was progressively undermined and rewritten in interesting ways - but that's part of a post about the characterization of labour and race in this movie, when I have more time...

*Particularly interesting because Dahl caught shit for making the Oompa-Loompas into "pygmies", took the criticisms into account, and decided to change their race and origin in the second edition of the book - looks like Burton went for the first version.
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
17:59 / 06.08.05
I always thought Charlie was supposed to be a cypher anyway- it was always more of a cautionary tale about what shits the other kids were- Charlie's more of a framing device than anything.
 
 
tea and biscuits
10:11 / 07.08.05
Ditto on finding it hard to make out the lyrics in the songs--I'm really looking forward to a DVD (so I can have the subtitles to help).

No need for the DVD my friend, just pick up a copy of your standard CATCF and start reading. All the lyrics are taken straight from the book...
 
 
gridley
01:27 / 08.08.05
All the lyrics are taken straight from the book...

Actually, no. It's been widely stated that John August and Danny Elfman re-wrote a lot of the Oompa Loompa lyrics.
 
 
lonely as a cloud...
07:29 / 08.08.05
Saw this at the weekend, and really enjoyed it. I thought the trailer misrepresented Depp's Wonka quite a lot - it had virtually all of Depp's dancing parts from the film, giving the impression that he capered his way through it. Good film, - slightly cheesy ending, though.
 
 
FinderWolf
19:35 / 08.08.05
is the original on DVD? I tried to NetFlix the original movie and they didn't have it.
 
 
FinderWolf
19:54 / 08.08.05
Just realized I could check on Amazon; the original is indeed on DVD. Damn NetFlix for not carrying it! I just emailed their 'buy this movie that you don't carry' dept.
 
 
Bard: One-Man Humaton Hoedown
20:02 / 08.08.05
I got very trippy after this movie. Not on drugs, mind, but I just sort of stumbled around the streets singing "Willy Wonka / Willy Wonka / The amazing choclatier" over and over again.

I loved it. Well, except the last quarter or so. But most of it was pure gold. Depp's Wonka was a character so pointless, as has been mentioned, after "Edward Scissor-hands" that I just sat back and enjoyed him playing this very very strange individual.

I'm wondering if it might just not be a point-of-reference issue, in addition to his autistic and at times almost schizophrenic tendencies, that makes Depp's Wonka so...well...creepy. Wonka's brain exists in such a completly different cultural referencepoint from most people that he seems delusional and quite mad. He's experienced some very odd things, like lost countries full of pygmy coke fiends and the construction of a factory that's seemingly bigger on the inside than the outside. His only companions are little PVC clad pygmies who worship the cocoa bean and only speak in English when they're singing their little rock songs following the slaughter of an orthax...or unfortunatly idiotic children blundering around the factory.

At the same time, he's also had god knows how many years to cultivate his ego. He's the king of his castle, and he knows it. The Oompa Loompas do everyone he asks of them, and he's got no one telling him "no" or "that might not be a great idea, Bill". His ego is his shelter from a world that he neither fully understands, nor fully WANTS to understand. He has entered into his own little, almost delusional state wherein he has lost his ability to understand "normal" human actions. He has literally changed his own definition of normalacy to fit living in a factory with edible turf, candy floss sheep, and inbred PVC pygmies who all look alike. Thus everything that "normal" people do is odd and out of context to him.

An argument could be made for him choosng Charlie becuase Charlie was the only person there who pandered to his ego properly, and didn't talk all the time. In fact, Charlie barely talked at all. A big plus! Mike Teevee was too agressive, Augustus Gloop was just disgusting no matter what cultural framework you come from (PLUS he polluted the chocolate river!). Veruca had an awful name and tried to command HIM. Violet chewed gum. Apparently Wonka had a horrible aversion to gum. And she wouldn't. Fucking. STOP! Well that and I think he had some issues with her mother giving him those puppy dog eyes.

Anyway, this is a very strage analysis of the movie that I just came up with as I typed it.

I may, or may not, buy this movie when it comes out on DVD. As much as I enjoyed it, I know I won't get the same reaction to it a second time, and I think that there's only so many times I can watch it before it gets old.
 
 
gridley
02:17 / 09.08.05
Finder, Netflix does carry Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory. I just looked it up.
 
 
FinderWolf
14:33 / 09.08.05
Weird - I'll get it now, thanks. Maybe I entered "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" instead, as I recall now...
 
 
Fritz K Driftwood
07:16 / 10.08.05
Just saw it, and while it is prettier and MOST of the movie is closer to Dahl's book, I thought Burton's ending was awful. WWATCF was darker than CATCF because Dahl actually wrote the screenplay. I didn't think that the story of Wonka and his father added anything at all to the story. It seemed tacked on as a last minute addition. The story has a moral framework already, and the new ending could have been incorporated into that, but it wasn't.

Also, I thought that Depp's Wonka was incredibly irritating. Like too many of Burton's movies, this was all about the pretty pictures and not about the story (like "Mars Attacks!" UGH!).

Perhaps it is just that WWATCF is the first movie that I saw in a movie theater. But Wilder's deadpan "Wait. Stop. Don't touch that." will always be the ultimate Wonka for me.

To end on a positive note (to me anyway), Wes Anderson is in pre-production for "Fantastic Mr. Fox", the book that delighted my already-curmudgeonly heart as a preteen.
 
 
Spaniel
10:06 / 27.11.05
Well I thought the ending was the worst, THE WORST, kind of Hollywood shit.

I know, why don't we tack on a message about family values, and how family is more important than anything, because, you know, there aren't enough movies with a family values message, and, well, family values really are the thing we should be talking about all the bloody time. I think we should ignore everything that was good about the original movie, the fact that its strengths lay in celebrating the danger and excitement of creativity and imagination, and get out the fucking family values.

Just my opinion
 
  

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