Chocolate and Lemurs: More Films

Yay for the summer. Here’s the one I’ve been looking forward to for months…

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

• Official Site
• Metacritic Rating: 72
• My Rating: 9.5/10

Brilliant: what a film! A non-stop romp through one of children’s literature’s greatest stars (Penguin’s best-selling title, ever), Charlie and the Chocolate Factory works brilliantly as a kids film.

But, unsurprisingly given the creative talent behind it, the film is very dark. Forget all your memories of the sugarry-sweet Gene Wilder version (which Roald Dahl himself famously loathed): this Charlie is a lot truer to the novel in style. Very visual, as are the books, this Chocolate Factory is exactly as I imagined it all those years ago when I read the book.

The slightly disturbing Michael Jackson overtones are unavoidable (and have been pointed out by almost every review of the film), but Depp’s portrayal of Willy Wonka as an overgrown child still suffering from a difficult childhood is pitched perfectly.

Freddie Highmore as Charlie is as charming as he was in Finding Neverland – the only “normal” character in a film full of exaggerations. The four supporting kids and their parents also pull of their roles brilliantly – helped by some very subtle effects work. And David Kelly as Grandpa Joe looks bizarrely like the BFG.

The addition of a backstory to explain Wonka’s raison d’être is a change that I think Dahl would have approved of – it certainly doesn’t make the film any lighter or fluffier.

Star of the show, though? Deep Roy, who played all of the Oompa Loompas. Brilliant. A fantastic perfomance (or thousands of them, rather).

Check out the references to Burton’s previous films (some more obvious than others) and enjoy!

Madagascar

• Official Site
• Metacritic Rating: 57
• My Rating: 6.5/10

OK, I enjoyed this. It wasn’t Shrek or The Incredibles, but then it was never going to be. But it is a pretty good kids films, with enough to keep the grown ups entertained for a couple of hours.

The story is nothing complicated, but has enough twists and facets to carry on for long enough. The animation is strange – think Hercules, back in the days when Disney was still hand-drawing films: this is a CG-animation, but one with a very distinctive visual design.

The voice talent is definitely what makes this film. The main group of four (Ben Stiller, Chris Rock, David Schwimmer, Zada Pinkett Smith) are very good, but the lesser characters are even better. Sacha Baron Cohen (aka Ali G) as the King of Lemurs is hilarious, while the Penguins and Monkeys, although only (relatively) briefly on screen, own this film.

There is a bit about halfway through where it seems the writers suddenly realised this was a film coming from the same studio as Shrek, and that they really ought to stick in a few parodies. Unfortunately, these seem fairly clumsy (and obvious from a mile away – especially the Planet of the Apes one – although the, hem, toning down of the language ruins the effect somewhat).

Anyway, a good way to wile away a nasty July afternoon.

“Smile and wave, boys. Smile and wave.”