Cathryn (formerly catslash) (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
remindmeofthe) wrote2005-07-15 07:40 pm
remindmeofthe) wrote2005-07-15 07:40 pm
(no subject)
First of all, may I just say I have loved all along that they are using the title of the book, as it should be?
Aw, man. AGAIN with the misbegotten ending rewrite. Happily, this time it didn't ruin the entire movie a la Hitchhiker's Guide, but it's still a good ten minutes or so that are pretty hard to swallow.
And they start out so well with Willy Wonka, too. As a character in any incarnation, Willy Wonka is scary. Gene Wilder can twinkle benignly all he damn well wants, but Wonka is a sociopath with no regard for others or anything except himself and the factory. (I don't know much about Gene Wilder, but judging from some of the other movies he did, I bet he knew that perfectly well and played with it as much as he could get away with; his Wonka is even more disturbing than the one in the book.)
Or, from another angle, Willy Wonka is a child with no regard for others or anything except himself and the factory. Child, sociopath, same difference, really.
The new adaptation sort of takes both views. It plays up Wonka's childishness, but makes it clear that this is not meant to be quirky and endearing. (Okay, fine, that's how I chose to read it, but bear with me here.) It's obvious right off the bat that Wonka is not well. He's not just different, or weird, he's flat-out crazy. A lot of that, of course, is in Johnny Depp's performance. His work here is broader and less subtle than in most of his roles - I suspect he was made to coarsen it up in order to make the all-too-plentiful "hurhurhur" humor work. He still gets it across, though, in his discomfort with the visitors and obnoxious mannerisms and the unbalanced line readings.
It's just wonderful, and I love the idea of Willy Wonka just being crazy . . . but then they had to go EXPLAIN it. And FIX it. They couldn't leave well enough alone. And dammit, it's not even done well. It's a clunky, stupid subplot that wastes Christopher Lee (and some great make-up on young Willy) as Wonka's obsessive dentist father (Get it? He loves candy because HIS FATHER WAS A REPRESSIVE DENTIST!! GETITGETITGETIT?!?!) and is painfully introduced with flashbacks. No, really. Complete with Wonka staring into space, swirly dissolvy screen, and lame segues from the narrator. I could have let that go, though, if it hadn't parlayed into such a stupid ending.
And the bummer is that at first the rewritten ending seems so good and audacious. When Charlie asks if his family may accompany him to the factory, instead of the immediate yes he gets in the book and first movie, Wonka flippantly says no, explaining that family just weighs you down and fucks up your creative flow. The acting is great here; he explains it so casually, expecting Charlie to understand and agree because that's How It's Supposed To Go, and is stunned when Charlie turns him without even hesitating. This is one of the scenes where Depp gets to employ subtlety. The shock and hurt in his face as Wonka makes his devastated exit, trying and utterly failing to seem unruffled, are perfect and emphasize the childish part of Wonka: faced with a denial he cannot argue away, he falls apart and flees, heartbroken.
I would not have objected if it ended there. It's a shock, and a hell of a departure from the story, but it's such a good scene.
Sadly, though, the movie meanders on for another ten minutes and gives us a nauseating happycute ending that does not fit at all. Also, the awkward hug that Wonka and his father share during their "touching" reunion has all the wrong kind of chemistry between Depp and Lee. Instead of being moved, I wanted them to make out. Which actually would have been really funny and a much better ending.
I will say, though, that the very very last scene, showing Wonka joining Charlie's family for dinner, is pretty funny and has the right kind of cute. I just wish the stuff that led up to it had been better, or even necessary.
And that's exactly the problem. It's unnecessary and wrong. It could have been the best material in the movie and it still would have sucked, because trying to quantify and explain Wonka and make him normal is a horrible thing to do.
The rest of the movie is mostly quite good. The visuals are lovely (I especially like the chocolate river meadow; in spite of the beauty and outdoorsy splendor, the lighting is a little dark and off, makes it a little closed in, and reminds us nicely that the whole thing is just a room inside a factory), the acting good all the way around (by which I mean none of the child actors made me want to gnaw off my own leg to escape), and the script mostly decent. It's also a pretty faithful adaptation, which I like, and even though it's not a musical, the Oompa Loompas still sing. As they should.
A lot of the humor is a bit pandering and wince-worthy, so I've suppressed it already. Some of it is genuinely funny, though. There are plenty of meta jokes, which I always like. After the first Oompa Loompa number, Mr Teevee {I think) says that it seemed awfully rehearsed. This leads to a discussion of improvisation (Wonka: "Give me a word." Violet: "Chewing gum." Wonka: "'Chewing gum is really gross, chewing gum I hate the most.' See? It's easy.") and logic, and probably ends with Wonka accusing Mike of mumbling. This in itself is a great running joke: Every time Mike dares employ science or logic, Wonka shuts him up by calling him a mumbler. I think they do that once or twice in the first movie, too.
Also, the nonsense from the trailers with Wonka crashing "hilariously" into the glass elevator's door isn't as stupid as it should be. The way they play it, it comes off as seeming like something Wonka probably does two or three times a week, and that, rather than the physical humor, is why it's funny.
So, yeah. In spite of that awful misstep, I'd go see it again. And since my mom and sister want to see it and make it a family thing, I probably will do just that next week.
Aw, man. AGAIN with the misbegotten ending rewrite. Happily, this time it didn't ruin the entire movie a la Hitchhiker's Guide, but it's still a good ten minutes or so that are pretty hard to swallow.
And they start out so well with Willy Wonka, too. As a character in any incarnation, Willy Wonka is scary. Gene Wilder can twinkle benignly all he damn well wants, but Wonka is a sociopath with no regard for others or anything except himself and the factory. (I don't know much about Gene Wilder, but judging from some of the other movies he did, I bet he knew that perfectly well and played with it as much as he could get away with; his Wonka is even more disturbing than the one in the book.)
Or, from another angle, Willy Wonka is a child with no regard for others or anything except himself and the factory. Child, sociopath, same difference, really.
The new adaptation sort of takes both views. It plays up Wonka's childishness, but makes it clear that this is not meant to be quirky and endearing. (Okay, fine, that's how I chose to read it, but bear with me here.) It's obvious right off the bat that Wonka is not well. He's not just different, or weird, he's flat-out crazy. A lot of that, of course, is in Johnny Depp's performance. His work here is broader and less subtle than in most of his roles - I suspect he was made to coarsen it up in order to make the all-too-plentiful "hurhurhur" humor work. He still gets it across, though, in his discomfort with the visitors and obnoxious mannerisms and the unbalanced line readings.
It's just wonderful, and I love the idea of Willy Wonka just being crazy . . . but then they had to go EXPLAIN it. And FIX it. They couldn't leave well enough alone. And dammit, it's not even done well. It's a clunky, stupid subplot that wastes Christopher Lee (and some great make-up on young Willy) as Wonka's obsessive dentist father (Get it? He loves candy because HIS FATHER WAS A REPRESSIVE DENTIST!! GETITGETITGETIT?!?!) and is painfully introduced with flashbacks. No, really. Complete with Wonka staring into space, swirly dissolvy screen, and lame segues from the narrator. I could have let that go, though, if it hadn't parlayed into such a stupid ending.
And the bummer is that at first the rewritten ending seems so good and audacious. When Charlie asks if his family may accompany him to the factory, instead of the immediate yes he gets in the book and first movie, Wonka flippantly says no, explaining that family just weighs you down and fucks up your creative flow. The acting is great here; he explains it so casually, expecting Charlie to understand and agree because that's How It's Supposed To Go, and is stunned when Charlie turns him without even hesitating. This is one of the scenes where Depp gets to employ subtlety. The shock and hurt in his face as Wonka makes his devastated exit, trying and utterly failing to seem unruffled, are perfect and emphasize the childish part of Wonka: faced with a denial he cannot argue away, he falls apart and flees, heartbroken.
I would not have objected if it ended there. It's a shock, and a hell of a departure from the story, but it's such a good scene.
Sadly, though, the movie meanders on for another ten minutes and gives us a nauseating happycute ending that does not fit at all. Also, the awkward hug that Wonka and his father share during their "touching" reunion has all the wrong kind of chemistry between Depp and Lee. Instead of being moved, I wanted them to make out. Which actually would have been really funny and a much better ending.
I will say, though, that the very very last scene, showing Wonka joining Charlie's family for dinner, is pretty funny and has the right kind of cute. I just wish the stuff that led up to it had been better, or even necessary.
And that's exactly the problem. It's unnecessary and wrong. It could have been the best material in the movie and it still would have sucked, because trying to quantify and explain Wonka and make him normal is a horrible thing to do.
The rest of the movie is mostly quite good. The visuals are lovely (I especially like the chocolate river meadow; in spite of the beauty and outdoorsy splendor, the lighting is a little dark and off, makes it a little closed in, and reminds us nicely that the whole thing is just a room inside a factory), the acting good all the way around (by which I mean none of the child actors made me want to gnaw off my own leg to escape), and the script mostly decent. It's also a pretty faithful adaptation, which I like, and even though it's not a musical, the Oompa Loompas still sing. As they should.
A lot of the humor is a bit pandering and wince-worthy, so I've suppressed it already. Some of it is genuinely funny, though. There are plenty of meta jokes, which I always like. After the first Oompa Loompa number, Mr Teevee {I think) says that it seemed awfully rehearsed. This leads to a discussion of improvisation (Wonka: "Give me a word." Violet: "Chewing gum." Wonka: "'Chewing gum is really gross, chewing gum I hate the most.' See? It's easy.") and logic, and probably ends with Wonka accusing Mike of mumbling. This in itself is a great running joke: Every time Mike dares employ science or logic, Wonka shuts him up by calling him a mumbler. I think they do that once or twice in the first movie, too.
Also, the nonsense from the trailers with Wonka crashing "hilariously" into the glass elevator's door isn't as stupid as it should be. The way they play it, it comes off as seeming like something Wonka probably does two or three times a week, and that, rather than the physical humor, is why it's funny.
So, yeah. In spite of that awful misstep, I'd go see it again. And since my mom and sister want to see it and make it a family thing, I probably will do just that next week.