Let me preface my review by saying that this movie got great reviews and is likely one that you'll enjoy. Now that that's out of the way, here's my review:
Tim Burton's Charlie & the Chocolate Factory is unique in its twisted visual and character display, making it sufficiently interesting for adults. However, unlike Nightmare Before Christmas, and certainly unlike the version starring Gene Wilder, it's not a loveable movie and it lacks the capacity to heartily capture the imagination of a child. At church on Sunday, one of the 8-yr-olds I teach who saw the movie twice due to happenstance said the movie was "good," but she didn't have anything more to say about it. My own kids enjoyed it but didn't beg to see it again and never discussed the movie further after we left the theater. Conversely, my 8-yr-old has commented on the Herbie movie a number of times.
There are so many things wrong about this movie--the CGI Oompa Loompas, the uninspiring room with the chocolate waterfall and edible candy flora, the absence of sinister Mr. Slugworth who offers to buy an Everlasting Gobstopper from the children. But the biggest "all-wrong" is the reinvention of Willie Wonka. Gene Wilder's Willie Wonka was a clever man with witty criticisms about the children. He oozed genius-ness, making it understandable that such a person was capable of creating such wondrous candy. Depp, on the other hand, is wooden and listless, handing out dull remarks or no remark at all each time a child is carried off due to indulging in a vice. And why is Depp doing a Stockard Channing/Michael Jackson imitation? It comes off as sick and twisted more than anything else. And do kids really need to see a Freudian exploration of Willie Wonka with those weird flashbacks? Gene Wilder's Wonka left us wondering about the candymaker by the end of the movie. Depp's Wonka is sufficiently revealed that by the end of the movie I was left wondering what pedophiliac crimes he may have committed.
Tim Burton's Charlie & the Chocolate Factory is unique in its twisted visual and character display, making it sufficiently interesting for adults. However, unlike Nightmare Before Christmas, and certainly unlike the version starring Gene Wilder, it's not a loveable movie and it lacks the capacity to heartily capture the imagination of a child. At church on Sunday, one of the 8-yr-olds I teach who saw the movie twice due to happenstance said the movie was "good," but she didn't have anything more to say about it. My own kids enjoyed it but didn't beg to see it again and never discussed the movie further after we left the theater. Conversely, my 8-yr-old has commented on the Herbie movie a number of times.
There are so many things wrong about this movie--the CGI Oompa Loompas, the uninspiring room with the chocolate waterfall and edible candy flora, the absence of sinister Mr. Slugworth who offers to buy an Everlasting Gobstopper from the children. But the biggest "all-wrong" is the reinvention of Willie Wonka. Gene Wilder's Willie Wonka was a clever man with witty criticisms about the children. He oozed genius-ness, making it understandable that such a person was capable of creating such wondrous candy. Depp, on the other hand, is wooden and listless, handing out dull remarks or no remark at all each time a child is carried off due to indulging in a vice. And why is Depp doing a Stockard Channing/Michael Jackson imitation? It comes off as sick and twisted more than anything else. And do kids really need to see a Freudian exploration of Willie Wonka with those weird flashbacks? Gene Wilder's Wonka left us wondering about the candymaker by the end of the movie. Depp's Wonka is sufficiently revealed that by the end of the movie I was left wondering what pedophiliac crimes he may have committed.
Comment