Charlie and the Chocolate Factory — Page 4

NoName3---Gene Wilder (as Wonka) does that all through the movie. He bastardizes and lifts quotes from random sources:

"99 and 44/100 percent pure." (Ivory Soap ad)
"Where is fancy bred? In the heart or in the head?"
"So shines a good deed in a weary world."
"A little nonsense now and then is relished by the wisest men."
"Bubbles, bubbles everywhere but not a drop to drink."
"A small step for mankind, a giant step for us."
"All I ask is a tall ship and a star to sail her by."
"Is it my soul that calls upon my name?
"Across the desert lies the promised land."
"Candy is dandy, but liquor is quicker."


And the tinker outside the factory who says, "Up the airy mountain, down the rushy glen. We dare not go a-hunting for fear of little men." (The Fairies by William Allingham - 1824-1889)

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Best12, I haven't seen the film since its original release in 1971, when I didn't think much of it. This thread has convinced me it's long past time to give it another try.

dreaming, I think Tilda Swinton could pull off the Grand High Witch in a new version of The Witches. I can think of a few other indie actresses who could do it justice but you just know they would go with a big name in that role to sell ticket.

Regarding Charlie, I don't know what they could do to fix the problem of Charlie. It sounds like, for the most part, the musical team went really faithful to the book which is great. I love that. But if you're going faithful to the book, Charlie is practically perfect in every way. His only struggle is poverty and even there he has no expectations of ever not being poor.

The only fix I can think of is to add in that Charlie is actually worried about what happens to the other children in the factory. It would make him an even purer character and allow for that all is well moment that cuts a lot of the tension in the films and book. He could voice his concerns a little louder after each punishment happens. Charlie could even reject Willy Wonka at the end when Wonka dismisses his concerns about the other children because they were naughty. Then Wonka could explain how being compassionate and kind was the final test.

It has the weight of the sacrificing the Gobstopper for drinking the Fizzy Lifting drink without having to add on an out of character naughty moment for Charlie. That could be a nice twist that stays very true to the book. Isn't there a moment where he says something like "What about Mike and Veruca and the others?" when they go up in the glass elevator?

Updated On: 5/24/13 at 02:15 PM

trentsketch, every time one of the children is dispatched in the stage show Charlie says "Poor Veruca!" or "Poor Augustus!" or "Poor Violet!" (admittedly I don't think he says it about Mike, but never mind - given how ecstatic Mrs Teavee is about his shrinking maybe he didn't think it was all that bad!).

I may have missed it if he mentions them again afterwards but I don't think he does - I suspect he's too caught up in the wonder of Wonka's ideas to think about them!

A song list was posted on the first page of this thread.

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By the way, there are definitely things I love about the Tim Burton film ...

Freddie Highmore is a wonderful Charlie. "Sincere" doesn't even begin to cover it. I love Helena Bonham Carter as his mom, too. Bad British teeth and all.

And I really love Missi Pyle's "crazy eyes" as Violet's mother. She belongs on Toddlers and Tiaras as one of the moms. Genius! I can't ever get enough Missi in my life.

I also love Geoffrey Holder's voice as the narrator. Takes me back to the "Cola Nut, Un-Cola Nut" Days.

Watching the movie now ...

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Updated On: 5/24/13 at 05:17 PM

I don't think the insinuation is supposed to be that Augustus and Veruca have actually died - that would be far too dark. I assume that, like in the original material, they're perfectly fine. But the show insinuates nasty things and then there's no time to ever see the children again, so there's always the possibility that they have met particularly gruesome fates!

Violet wears a costume that inflates after she chews the amazing gum and, thanks to some very clever lighting, she appears to be turning purple in front of us. She then runs upstage, gets some proper makeup put on her, and gets strapped into a disco ball - the Oompa Loompas sing a song called "Juiced!", the lyrics of which I unfortunately couldn't hear a single word of, while doing disco choreography.

One of the clever things they did in the 1971 film was to cast all of the children in the town where Charlie lived with Americans. Charlie and his family were a mix of American and European.

But nearly all other adults were European (mostly British or German).

And they shot all the exteriors for the town in Germany (very obviously so, with the architecture).

All of that was intentional (according to the director) to make it unclear exactly where Charlie was from.

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ATG are lining up Cherlie for the Foxwoods is a strong rumour flying.

"it presents the problem of having an entire story told where nobody involved is realistic, including the protagonist."

This is the problem in the book MATILDA as well. And it is a problem that the creators of the musical MATILDA were unable to solve (or maybe they did not think it was a problem). This is why I found it so difficult to care about any of the characters in that show; there was NO ONE I could identify with.
The writer of the original WILLY WONKA film (David Seltzer) really worked at solving that problem by fleshing the story out and making Charlie and his Grandpa much more realistic, while keeping all the other characters as silly and cartoonish. Seltzer also added the part about Slugworth being a double agent who really works for Wonka and he added that test for Charlie. When Charlie makes that HUGE sacrifice by placing the Gobstopper on Wonka's desk, that is still a very powerful moment in the film. All of this was not in the book or the Burton film, which makes them both inferior to the 1971 film. Not sure how the new musical version will deal with this, but it is definitely a problem in almost all of Dahl's books; unrealistic characters and simplistic plots. I hope the new musical fixes this, otherwise I fear we are in for another MATILDA-like musical.

Burton took another perfect property (he specializes in ruining my favorites) and Depped it up with poor storytelling, cartoonish characters and way to much "production value". The farther the stage version stays away from his version, the better.

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Incredibly strange question, but how was the music other than those songs (scene change music, underscoring, etc.)?