Wonka (2023)

Score: 2 / 5

Few filmmakers could recreate the "Chocolate Factory" source material in a fresh and family-friendly way after what has already been done to it -- and considering the deeply uncomfortable themes it carries -- but Paul King is perhaps the best bet working today. After his work on Paddington and its sequel, and short of a Disney-fied approach, King does indeed gently pry open the possibilities of the material while honoring and challenging what has come before. In his capable hands, this origin story of Willy Wonka takes the form of an original movie musical that flies by in bright colors, wacky performances, and entertaining tunes in two hours of escapism. It's also one of the weirdest and most forgettable movies of the year.

I am a little biased in that I've never liked this story. Roald Dahl is not a writer I appreciate nor enjoy, and the previous cinematic adaptations of this story (1971 and 2005) are not movies I ever actively choose to watch. Thankfully, a lot of the ickier parts of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory have been swept aside here, as Wonka himself becomes the main character as he comes into his own as a business owner. King leans into the magic of Wonka -- I've never really thought of the material as consisting of "magic" in a fantasy sense, so this was off-putting to me -- letting him fly around and do all sorts of impossible things. His edible creations are absurdly concocted, and there is no explanation for his magical potionmaking nor his fantastically contrived briefcase. It seems King's goal here is to turn Wonka into a male version of Mary Poppins, sugar and all.

And that's about the long and short of it. King's control over tone and whimsy is masterful, and the film's exuberant flair is never short of astonishing. The mostly Dickensian backstory for Wonka doesn't do much to give him an actual character, but it allows a spectacular contrast to form between the world as it is and the world as Wonka makes it. In the shockingly brief time it takes him to buy a condemned store and turn it into his first factory -- looking alarmingly like Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes -- we are transported from a mostly brown -and-gray stone-and-wool palette to, well, candy colored confections that do magical and impossible things in real time. In addition to its aggressive production design, costumes and hair are wonderfully eccentric here.

New music -- songs composed by Neil Hannon of the Irish band The Divine Comedy -- is mostly charming in this film, though even after leaving the cinema, I couldn't have even hummed a single tune for you. Not that every musical has to have endless "bops," but it's telling when the Oompa Loompa song and "Pure Imagination" are the heavy hitters now as they were half a century ago. None of the performers are particularly adept singers, which doesn't help. Timothee Chalamet plays Wonka himself, in turns eerily uninterested in the role and horrifyingly enthusiastic, doing a strange balancing act of Wilder's jubilant sociopathy and Depp's innocent predatory qualities while trying to make the character his own. He's not unwatchable, though his singing leaves something to be desired; his voice is too earnest and unpolished for a character who's both a mad magician-scientist and a Dickensian young man trying to escape debtor's prison and the workhouse.

The rest of the cast fares little better. Sally Hawkins is wasted in flashbacks as Wonka's mother, who inspired in him a love of chocolate. Hugh Grant as an Oompa Loompa is the most horrifying and uncomfortable thing I've seen on film all year, and I had nightmares about him, even apart from his nonsensically written role and the disturbing lack of in-film logic about his character, motivation, and narrative. The rest of the cast is essentially split into dual ensembles. The good guys include the terribly named Noodle (Calah Lane, an orphan girl who becomes Wonka's assistant), accountant Abacus (Jim Carter), and other debtors Piper (Natasha Rothwell), Larry, and Lottie. The villains comprise a network of corrupt business folks and officials making sure the monopoly on chocolate is maintained by the wealthy at the top: the Cartel is led by (admittedly delightful) characters played by Paterson Joseph, Matt Lucas, and Mathew Baynton. They are assisted by a chocolate-addict priest (Rowan Atkinson), a similarly corrupt (Keegan-Michael Key, fulfilling Dahl's trope of moral ugliness manifesting in unnatural and unappealing body forms), and the insatiably greedy (and horny) boardinghouse owner Mrs. Scrubitt and her henchman (Olivia Colman and Tom Davis).

It's a fine film, all in all, and a pleasantly diverting two hours. And I don't think there are any "bad jobs" in terms of filmmaking (with the exception of that monstrous Oompa Loompa). So it's odd, maybe, that I disliked Wonka as much as I did. The production design, cinematography, and choreography are annoyingly good; the screenplay, score, and performances feel forced and a bit dissonant. While a few larger themes are introduced -- race is an interesting entry point in terms of casting, but also the class system, indentured servitude, and even briefly colonialism -- but none are brought to fruitful meaning or significance half so much as simply having faith in the impossible, which fairy tales and Disney taught us long ago. By its finale, the film tries hard to tug your heartstrings, but it's such a heavyhanded effort that I started itching to leave the auditorium. Kids will enjoy it, as I imagine will fans of the material. But the lack of earned sentiment or even higher purpose in this production, along with the "too much of a good thing" aesthetic it embraces, made this one rot my gut.