Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
(2005) dir. Tim Burton
viewed: 08/10/05 at Loews Metreon Theatres, SF, CA
Tim Burton exhibits on his usual strengths here, great visual design and largely fun entertainment, but still displays a real lack of narrative power. I actually found this film pretty fun all the way through. Burton has been trying to pack a more emotional punch lately, and this film, though not powerful in that regard, delivers as much as any of his films ever had in that regard.
Johnny Depp is very good as the bizarre cartoonish recluse, playing camp for laughs. There is this sentimental part of the film where Willy Wonka makes up with his long-estranged father. Burton has used this motif before in his 2003 film, Big Fish, which some read as a personal commentary on his strained relationship with his own father who passed away prior to the making of the film. His handling of this content is pretty schmaltzy, not as deft or sickening as Spielberg, but more forced and unnatural.
I have said it before and I will say it again. I don’t think that Tim Burton will ever make a great movie. But he may well continue to make films that are really fun and visually striking, like Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and maybe that is good enough.
