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To me this is arguably Gene Wilder's best role. Of all the stuff I've seen him in this is the most indelible performance and character he performed and created for the silver screen. I hope I don't sound like I'm fawning, but the sarcastic quips and baiting he provide in his Wonka character are exacting and just simply laugh-out-loud hilarious.
To me this is one of the last of the great non-Disney children's films. Made in a day and age when process shots were expensive and hard to produce, Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory rely on the musical trend of the time, but do so successfully I think. So much that I think modern contemporary audiences, most of whom disdain the musical genre, will go along with the numbers as part of the narrative, and not as something meant to draw attention to themselves for the sake of adornment.
Even in my middle age I am delighted by this film, and even though I knew the film backwards and forwards like a lot of other adults who saw this film when it first premiered on the big screen in 1971, I still felt a thrill when Charlie has his big moment of luck. I felt like a boy all over again. And when Willy Wonka makes his smiling remarks to the various comments and actions made by his guests touring his establishment, I simply could not hold back my laughter.
Even as a teen and 20-something when I saw this film I smiled at both the story and the Wonka character, as well as at Charlie and his family.
To me Willy Wonka was made in a time when there was still a kind of understood (all be it tacit) "respect" for the spirit of the ever so repressive rules of the former Hayes' office that had clamped down on a lot of perceived "immorality" portrayed in films. Nobody wants to take their kid to a film with a lot of sex and explicit gory violence. And where everyone has a kind of innate understanding of what is proper and improper, to me Willy Wonka has that kind of essence of truly making a family film, or a G-rated film that can be enjoyed by everyone.
The script is intelligent and witty, the child actors are truly marvelous in this, and the leads and supporting cast do their usual exceptional bang up job. And the music isn't half bad either.
Colorful, a bit slower paced in terms of editing, but no less full of zest for modern conventional story telling style, Willy Wonka is the kind of film they don't make anymore but should. And kudos to the entire cast, and in particular Gene Wilder for giving us the sly eccentric genius whose quest for character is fulfilled superbly.
A great film. Get a copy or stream it for yourself, or with those you love.
Enjoy.
score /10
Blueghost 14 February 2017
Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw3639786/ |
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30-11-2019 00:38:36
