Charlie and the Kookoonut Factory

Rating: 4/10 (11 September 2005)

I'm a huge Tim Burton fan, I think he's visually brilliant, and I generally tip my hat to Johhny Depp for sheer audacity alone, but I have to regretfully acknowledge that watching this film was not what I would call a pleasant experience by any stretch (no pun intended).
It was OK during the set-up, when we meet Charlie (the perfectly cast Freddie Highmore) and his maniacally eccentric family - the film actually works while we're all waiting to see how Charlie's going to become one of the five supposedly lucky souls who finds the all-important Golden Ticket and gets to visit - moment of reverential silence - The Factory. But soon as Depp shows up, looking like a deranged cross between Jane Fonda, Billy Crystal and Faye Dunaway, it's downhill all the way, unfortunately. I never thought I would agree with the people who had said there were parallels between this version of Wonka and Michael Jackson, but these people were sadly on the money: here we have an emotionally crippled character, damaged from childhood, who becomes the antithesis of everything his father stood for, the ultimate act of neurotic rebellion in full force. To his credit, by the third act, Wonka realizes he's monumentally dysfunctional, which is cemented in a retardedly demented Oompa Loompa therapy session.
And let's talk about these Oompa Loompas - they're undeniably creepy by any standards, let's face it, and the musical numbers become more psychotic as the scenario goes on. I was thinking about three fourths of the way through that I needed some serious drugs to properly appreciate this movie, I mean the endorphins released by mere chocolate unfortunately were hardly enough to cut the proverbial mustard.