Tim Burton takes on Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory

Rating: 6/10 (26 December 2013)

Who knows why a great artist want to take on such an iconic unique movie? Maybe he wants the challenge. It starts with a dark depressing vision of Charlie Bucket's (Freddie Highmore) poverty. He finds one of five Golden ticket to visit Willy Wonka's (Johnny Depp) chocolate factory. The movie spends too much time in the Bucket home, and takes too long to get to the chocolate factory. Most of the audience already know what's going to happen. The Bucket home should be nothing more than an intro, but it goes on for more than 30 minutes before we take one step into the factory.
Once we get Johnny Depp on screen, the movie gets moving better. I love the Tim Burton vision at his weirdest. Freddie Highmore is certainly a very capable young actor. Johnny Depp adds his own sort of weirdness. I love his weird take on Willy Wonka. On the other hand, I'm not sure about the Oompa Loompas. Mainly, I'm not sure about using the same actor for all Oompa Loompas. I do admit that it makes them even weirder. I would have given this a 7/10, but I have to subtract 1 for the slow start without Johnny Depp.