WIlly Wonka, WIlly Wonka!

http://mp3content01.bcst.yahoo.com/bmfroot02/BMFShare02/yahoomovies/4/10140065.mov ^

[GOP Jedi]

Clink in the URL above for the new Tim Burton "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" trailer. The song will worm its way into your brain.

Depp, on the other hand, looks disturbingly like Michael Jackson.

[puppetz]

You got it backwards. Roald Dahl, the author of "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" completely disowned the WIlder version BECAUSE It was so light and insipidly sweet and sentimental. The book is not so, and really none of Dahl's books were.

I think Burton's darker and more stylistic version will be a better and more true movie representation of the author's intent. The '71 version was ok but it was campy and smaltzy and the musical numbers were badly staged and the production somewhat low-budget. The special effects were sad, even for the time. Outside of Wilder's perfomance there isn't much there, and he isn't even in more than half the film.

Really, if you don't get over an actor's politics you'll never go to any movie again. Sure I think Depp is a dillitante who doesn't know wtf he's talking about, but I've enjoyed more than a dozen movies he's been in, just as I enjoyed George Clooney in O Brother and Intolerable Cruelty. The list goes on. You have to just get past that if you don't want to stop going to all movies unless they are The Passion of Christ (Monica Belluci's politics aren't exactly right wing for those of you who don't know it).

A movie, unlike a live performance by a musician like say the DIxie Chicks or something is too large a production to just be the work and paycheck for one person, so I don't sweat it. I like Burton, I like Depp as an actor going back to CryBaby and 'Gilbert Grape, Benny & Joon, Ed S'hands, Sleepy Hollow, Platoon, Ed Wood, The Man WHo Cried, Chocolat, Donnie Brasco, THe Ninth Gate, Blow, so many movies I own ofhis on DVD (some duds too like Don Juan Demarco and The Astronaut's WIfe, hey they can't all be gems).

I'm looking forward to this movie plus The COrpse Bride also directed by Burton starring Depp and Helene Bonham Carter.

[larlaw]

I agree...if there was ever someone who was perfect for a role, it was Gene Wilder as Willy Wonka. Johnny Depp may be a great actor, but I can't see anyone else as WW but Gene Wilder...

[Cobra64]

Geeze, Loise. I saw that title and thought of Slick at the sink.

[alessandrofiaschi]

ping bump willy wonka

[Swordmaker]

Michael Jackson? No, he looks more like Mary Tyler Moore...

[Caipirabob]

actually I've never seen a bad Tim Burton movie

Did he do the "Batman" films? Batman would have slapped him upside the head for those, but he would have had to wait for me to finish first.

On the other hand, this film may be ideal for Burton. You need to view his work without any previous expectations. He does has an amazing sense of creativity. It just needs to be applied to the right project.

Baring any obscene behavior or language in this film, I'll probably go see it. If it's suitable, I'll even take the kids. Rold Dalh has always been a favorite of mine, and should be a great subject for Burton. I think they see the world the same way.

"Wangdoodles and Vermicious Knids"

[Calvin Locke]

I remember growing up with the [Hollywood] impression of Dahl's being a writer of children's stories.

Then I saw his tv series "Carousel" which I believe was also called "Tales of the Unexpected".

[dawn53]

Why anyone would attempt to do a remake of Willy Wonka is beyond me.

You don't mess with perfection, and that movie was as near to perfection of what it was and should be, that Burton's attempt seems destined to fail.

[tiamat]

Thank you.

I had read Dahl's book when I was about 8. Part of what I liked about the book was the slightly dark flavor to it.

(Okay, I was a somewhat eerie little girl)

I was excited when it was announced that there would be a movie in '71, and we went to see it. I was 10 then.

I was SO disappointed! That whole movie was just WRONG, from start to finish. Too light, too syrupy, too campy. Just WRONG.

I don't blame Mr. Dahl at ALL for being upset.

I'm looking forward to this new Willie Wonka, and since we now have things like Lemoney Snickett, I hope they forget the PC pandering and will do it up right

[Recovering Hermit]

Did he do the "Batman" films?

He did the first two. I thought the first Batman was a good flick...everything else basically sucked, mainly because Michael Keaton was replaced for the sequel.

[Kerfuffle]

I dunno. IMHO Gene Wilder brought a definite unnerving edge to the '71 film, and if you get past the gooey music, there's a sense that Willy Wonka's world is hell as a candy factory.

[KateatRFM]

I agree -- I felt that the picture Gene Wilder presented to the gang that was touring his factory was only a molecule-thick facade, and they really did know it. I would have liked to see the children vanish for good, though; I was a law and order type back then.

The thing that surprised me about the book was that Dahl made it very much clearer that Charlie's family was on the cusp of starvation and if Wonka hadn't intervened, they would soon have been found dead in their shack. And I didn't think he picked them out of altruism; there was a calculation there I still don't understand. Finally, I go the feeling that he had included the other children to give Charlie a very clear idea of what happened to dissidents in his world. I don't think a lot of people will like it, but the new movie if it is true to the book at all will find a definite audience when it goes to DVD.

[valkyrieanne]

Dahl isn't a light happy-crappy writer. His stories always seem to get sanitized for the screen. This isn't a remake of the 1971 movie anyway; it's a Tim Burton adaptation, which means it's going to be pure weird Tim Burton / Danny Elfman / Johnny Depp. They're the triumverate of bizarre.

[Lizavetta]

When are they going to make Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator?

I can think of a whole host of people who would be perfect Vermicious Knids.

[puppetz]

I liked Batman. Nicholson probably gave the best portrayal of a comic book villian ever, at least the most memorable, and it was very stylish and cool. And Devito in Batman Returns was great, plus Michele Pheiffer, ROWR! And I like Michael Keaton in about anything he does. THe production design was amazing. And you have to admit they are both better than the following Batmans Burton didn't do.

[puppetz]

He wasn't replaced in the sequel. He was replaced in the next 2 however, and they did suffer the loss of Keaton and Burton.

[Ready4Freddy]

Thought I heard that Richards was going to play the part of (Captain :) Jack Sparrow's father.

[KateatRFM]

You know what movie Tim Burton ought to make next? "Mary Poppins." If you have read those books, you know that Mary Poppins would have terrified the life out of Julie Andrews; she was a space alien, not a dancing lollipop.

[Republican Wildcat]

Why are they remaking a perfectly good movie? This will likely flop just like the rest of the remakes.

[GOP Jedi]

Why are they remaking a perfectly good movie? This will likely flop just like the rest of the remakes.

Why did anyone do Hamlet after Sir Lawrence? After Booth? Those remakes didn't flop.

All of his comments suggest that Tim Burton and John August (the screenwriter) are following Dahl's book, whereas the first movie did not (it does not even use the same title). I enjoyed the first film adaptation of the novel (Dahl didn't), and I may enjoy the second. I won't dismiss it unseen, however.