Willy Wonka

My wife, when she was a child, wanted to watch Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory as it premiered on national television in the late seventies, which was a big deal because there were only three stations at the time and the rerunning of movies were few and far between. Her parents, however, used the movie as a form of discipline, not allowing her to watch the broadcast after breaking a rule, so she spent the evening peeking from the door jamb of her room, trying to get any kind of glimpse of the film. I think that experience made the movie even more magical for her and the film lifted itself into a special place in her heart.

When I think of the film, I am always drawn to the scene when they are licking flavored wallpaper and Gene Wilder turns to Veruca and says," We are the music-makers, and we are the dreamers of dreams." I considered Wilder's ability to bring the spontaneity and crazed-compassion of Willy Wonka to the screen as the strongest element of the original motion picture. So, when Tim Burton's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory opened this weekend, we had to go see it and compare the two versions.

I was concerned about the new movie at first because so many people are currently making dreadfully awful remakes of films and television shows. My other concern, of course, was the affinity the American public has created for Gene Wilder's Willy Wonka character, and how Johnny Depp would respond to tackling such a well-known role. The original, even though Roald Dahl wrote its screenplay, drifted from the novel a bit so I also wondered if the new film would follow the novel's course more or not.

I have always been an admirer of Tim Burton, seeing all of the movies he has made (they even showed a clip of his next movie, Corpse Bride, in the new film's preview), including his first film Frankenweenie, and have always wanted to come from his movies excited and inspired. A past student of mine, Perry Walston, even played a lead role in one of the films Burton made in Alabama called Big Fish, so I was eager to see how Burton would do this time.

When you like an artist's work it can be hard to give a negative critique because our society tends to take stars and become devotees to them through thick and thin. I think that is a dangerous way to support an artist because an artist needs to receive realistic feedback on what works and what doesn't. Many bands have fans like that, who will take a record that was not well-received and still claim that it contains moments of brilliance. In truth, we all have down times. Even the most creative artists in the world experience failure, which is good because, I believe, only success can arise from failure.

Although I am a big Tim Burton fan, I must acknowledge that he has had some failures. I have always enjoyed his creative, Robert Smith-like approach to movies, but sometimes they have soured. The biggest disappointment, I suppose, was Batman Returns. Even going to see The Nightmare Before Christmas on opening day I came from the film with a feeling of approval, but I still felt like I was wanting the movie to be greater than the film's actually ability to be great on its own. I found Big Fish, as I watched it with much anticipation at my student's special opening day screening, was the same way, so when I purchased tickets to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory from Fandango, I was silently hoping that Tim Burton could return to the brilliance of old with films like Edward Scissorhands and Beetlejuice.

Happily, I can say that Charlie and the Chocolate Factory does work very well. The story line, especially with the revelations of Willy Wonka's past childhood, makes the film a much more cohesive whole. Despite having a xeroxed-copied Oompa-Loompa throughout the movie, Burton, through his wit and artistic vision, was able to recreate the Wonka masterpiece into its own realm of magic. Johnny Depp did a fantastic job of making the personality of Willy Wonka separate from Gene Wilder's adaptation, which is a strong reason for the film to exist as an alternative to the original and, thankfully, not a verbatim copy.

I think the Oompa-Loompas' songs were one of the most exciting parts about the film because there formats and atmosphere fit well to each child's fault that they sung about. Also, the artistic detail that Burton, a fabulous artist himself, brings to the film, like the crooked Bucket shack and the details of the factory, succeeds fabulously. All in all, I find my past affections for Tim Burton's work renewed, and I can hardly wait to view Corpse Bride on its opening night as well.

I think Tim Burton, or for that matter anyone else thinking about riding Wonka's success, should never make a film of Roald Dahl's sequel, Charlie and the Glass Elevator, because even Dahl himself admitted that it was a book he wished he had never written; he had only produced the sequel following pressure from his agents after the original film's world-wide acceptance. Roald Dahl, a very interesting writer who has always despised parents and schooling, and Tim Burton, one of the only original directors in Hollywood today, compliment each other's abilities wonderfully. It would be amazing to see what they could have produced together if Dahl was still alive.