HLJ's Movie Blog

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was fun, fun, fun. My favorite parts were when the puppet display burned. Ever been to any of the Disney theme parks? If you have you will love that scene. It was also brilliant when the puppets then reappeared in the puppet hospital and burn unit – a recent development. Johnny Depp was fantastic in this movie. After this movie, Pirates of the Caribbean, and Finding Neverland, I will never doubt his skill as an actor again. Actually, I couldn’t watch films that he appeared in for a long time because I saw Edward Scissorhands about 100 times while I worked in a movie theater. I have a similar issue with Julia Roberts but hopefully I won't ever get over that.

My one question about this movie is why did everything have to make sense and be explained? Did we have to know where the Oompa Loompas came from? Did we have to understand why Willy Wonka smiles the way he does and has perfect teeth? It seems rather strange to have to come up with a logical explanation for everything in the story. Isn’t it supposed to me whimsical? There’s a brief scene in the movie where Willy Wonka and the remaining children encounter a room where candy is being shot out of cannons and explodes into sparks as they are riding in the glass elevator. Mike Teavee comments that nothing makes sense in the room. Charlie retorts that candy doesn’t need to make sense. So why did everything in this movie have to make sense? I guess I don’t mind, but it would have been okay to think that Willy Wonka was just kinda weird instead of getting some psychological explanation for his quirks.