Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

Hated it!!!

I love the original, and was excited to see this new version but, found out it didn’t hold a candle to the original. Even with the CGI, which really wasn’t all that impressive, it never came close to being good or even half good. I hated just about everything this movie threw at me, the ompas, Depp as Wonka was a bad choice, The flash backs were terrible and unnecessary, I thought the acting was sickening with the exception of the kid that played Charlie. The songs were bad bad bad, and that little weird laugh of Depp's was annoying to say the least. It should have been darker and Willy Wonka should have been maniacal and mysterious with a dark edge. The factory itself was not all that interesting just a bad rehash of the original film. I found myself wondering why I was still watching it at one point, but I don't like to stop a movie once I start into it. Then came the ending, which was probably the worst part of the entire film. I am so glad I deiced to rent it instead of buying it. I feel bad enough I wasted my time with it, at least I didn’t blow 20$ like I did on "The Hitch Hikers guide to the galaxy". I have to give it two thumbs down in the toilet; sorry all you that liked it but I have to say it was a huge let down to me.

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Although I really liked the original as a child, it strayed from the book quite a bit, even if the detours were mostly exclusionary in nature. Also, I see a complaint about the songs in the new film, but yet no complaint about the excruciatingly bad "Cheer up Charlie" from the original. I would rather have my beard caught in the gears of a trans-continental bus than hear that song again. How about the song Wonka sings while people are in the edible room? Terrible. Meanwhile, especially after a second viewing, I LOVE the new oompa tunes, and think they are ingeniusly written. Burton pokes enough fun at the songs in the film itself to let us know they ARE a bit goofy, but that they are supposed to be.

Each film has it's pros and cons, but I find I have trouble sitting through the original these days. I like the psychadelic overtones of the original, but it plays flat today, and the films just looks so dated, because of these art design oddities that were cool then, but are simply dated and cornball today. I feel Burton injected tounge-in-cheek homage to both the old film and the time period it was made in to bring new life and a fresh vibe to the new flick, while retaining some of the original trappings.

One thing I will agree on, is that the flashbacks were sort of unnecessary and ham handed, but I think Burton had something to say about family, and this was his chosen device. As for the acting, I like it, across the board. Depp is over-the-top, but acts more like the Wonka I had envisioned while reading the book as a child. Burton also included some of my favorite parts of the book, like Chocolate Mountain, and the Indian Chocolate Palace, while removing some of the scenes from the first film that didn't play like the book. The fizzy lifting drink was just sort of an aside in the book (which involved an oompa loompa, not the Buckets), and not a main plot device. The stealing of the fizzy drink by the Buckets was a total fabrication that was part of the tacked on theft storyline in the original film.



"Burp!! Burp, you silly ass!" - Wonka to an Oompa Loompa

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I just didn't get it.
I love Burton and Depp, but this is one collaboration that I just didn't get into, it was a little too weird for me.
Not one of their better efforts, Sleepy Hollow is still one of my favourite collaborations between Burton and Depp, but unfortunately Charlie just didn't engage me enough.

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I think I liked the film because there was such a conflict between the silly, light-heartedness and the moody darkness lurking just beneath it. It's an uncomfortable mixture, but it reflects well Roald Dahl's original vision (Tim Burton notwithstanding). I love it that the film messes with audience cues. Some scenes start funny enough, and you find yourself laughing; but by the end of the scene, things start to move toward disturbing (and even horrifying), and you feel like an idiot for having laughed. A stroke of genius on Burton's part, I'd argue.

What some people hated, I rather liked. I thought the flashbacks were interesting, picturesque, and necessarily stylized. I really like the child versus adult perspective theme, and how many avenues regarding that theme you can find and follow throughout the picture.

I'd say more, but I've gotta run...

The original was the more solid film in many ways, but it was ruined for me by a pervasive look of 70s cheap chintzy crappiness, even in the putatively wondrous chocolate factory. Therefore I always remember it as vaguely depressing.

I thought Burton, imaginative stylist that he is, would be perfect for giving the story the gloss it so badly needed. And he did; this one looked fantastic.

And yet it was no better than the original. The story felt tired, there was little zip to the dialogue. Depp was pretty good, and the matching Beauregards were pretty funny, but I doubt any of the characters will linger long in my memory. Wonka was a somewhat different character now, but generally, this was a rehash, and that's disappoiting from a man who tried to infuse his previous remake, Planet of the Apes, with a unique life of its own.

To be fair, though, translating the book is a pretty rigid affair. It isn't like there's much room for deviation. And I'm thinking that the ones who will be committing Burton's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory to memory will be today's younger viewing audience.

Yeah, many elements would need to stay much the same.

I would say that there would have been plenty of room for new imagination in some still pretty important details, for example, the faults & fates of the other children.

I did like this movie, it wasn't great, i thought all the children were great, i loved the Busby Berkley feel to the musical numbers

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I loved this movie! Although the Oompa Loompa songs in this one left something to be desired Johnny Depp was amazing in it though, the kid who played Charlie not so much.

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I liked this movie accualy. although I didn't really like how the used just one person to play all of the Oompa Loompas. I thought that the songs they sang were entertaining, just very strange. I liked the set they created in this one. Its definatly more twisted, and the squirel scene they used I thought was funny, especialy because it was somthing that you didn't expect. it fit so well into the story and the new kind of Charlie and The Chocolate Factory,world.
however I wasn't that fond of the habits that Willy Wonka (Johnny Depp) had this time around. I also didn't like the costumes in this one. but I liked almost everything else.

I liked this alot more than the original, and I loved the original.

First off, Depp really did a good job here. Whereas Wilder really made a subtle madman, Depp presented it more out front and made for a much more understandable character. Also, he was a lot more humorous. Wilder was very bland, in my opinion.

The oompa loompa songs were very lame. The attempted hair metal-esque song made me cringe. I think the original gave a much more ample soundtrack, oompa-wise.

Lastly, gotta say that the story was built very well and never really strayed off onto any tangents. It left a great setting and a very good character space. Even thought the log cabin ending was rather warm and cute.

I was expecting it to be a little scary buy the only thing that was scary about it was how closely depp looked like Michael Jackson, Re-makes are rearley good

Saw this for the first time last night and didn't like it. It was ok at the start, but went downhill. Depp was creepy as Wonka, as well as creepily like Jacko in places, as has been pointed out. Anyway, a far cry from the avuncular but slightly unhinged Wonka of the books. And why was he reading off a card? The Buckets were all right, so were the other kids (except Veruca), but I didn't like the oompa loompas or their songs. There were some nice touches, like when the young Wonka is walking past the flags (even if that did seem to belong more to The Simpsons than Charlie...). The ending "but Willy Wonka got something even better, a family" was vomit-inducingly awful, even for a kids movie.

I thought the original was a lot better. However, I did see this in IMAX and the graphics and effects were great. Johnny Depp was an interesting choice to play Wonka. I have to agree with Thursday Next that Depp was kinda creepy.

My choice for worst film I saw in 2005. Srsly.
I came so so so so close to walking out of this, and I NEVER do that. What a terrible misfire.

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7/10

The film was ok but not the best from Johny Depp. I was suprised about the two German acteurs in the movie. The film was sometimes funny but I think it never will take place between my other DVDs

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I just saw this film and thought it was dreadful. I don't know how you can really compare this to the original film (well, I mean, I know HOW you can do it, but I don't know WHY you would do it). They are such different films: the original was a true family film with a warm spirit (despite some lousy music); this one is an aseptic mess of CG and false sentimentality. Depp's Wonka is thoroughly unlikeable, although I think that was sort of the point. I enjoyed Highmore and the one playing the grandfather, but felt that they were given too little to do in the film. Otherwise, a poorly paced and poorly acted effects piece.

It's not ment to be compared with the original film, rather what it is based on...the novel itself. Burton's version is more "true" to the source that that with Wilder.

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