The kids and I saw Charlie and the Chocolate Factory last night at the cheap theater. When I heard they were making this movie I had my doubts. They were confirmed when I saw the trailer. It's Johnny Depp. Now I loved the guy (hottie) when I was in middle school. Now he's just a neurotic French-wanna-be (sorry Owensboro) who only plays over-the-top characters, some of whom I like (Captain Jack Sparrow), some I hated (Edward Scissorhands) and others I won't like because I refuse to see the films (Chocolat). Back to Willy Wonka...The trailers looked dark and scary, even weirder than the first movie. I'm not a big Tim Burton fan. I liked the first movie because it was so clever and creative. Gene Wilder was great. It taught some valuable lessons and used candy to keep the kids' attention while doing it. This new one was going to suck like so many other remakes before it. But we wanted to see a movie at the theater and March of the Penguins apparently makes children cry.

So about the new one. It's great. I was wrong. Well, I was a little right about Johnny Depp. He was weird. His performance was much more forced, fake, if you will, than Wilder's. Wilder was weird in a soothing way. Depp was weird in an uptight alien way. But he still had parts that cracked me up. The dialogue was the key. It was so much funnier than the old one. And they cut out all the crappy songs like "Cheer Up Charlie" (fast-forward). I did miss the Veruca Salt "I Want the World" song though. The children were all true to the old characters and well played. New Charlie was actually ten times better than old, whiny Charlie. The new grandparents were funny, especially Grandpa George (not a factor in the first). They kept to the original story for the most part. Some large chunks were eliminated like the fizzy lifting drink, the stolen gobstoppers and Slugworth. Turns out - not important. They also changed the way Veruca left but the new way was pretty funny too. The oompa-loompas were different as well. They were ALL played by Deep Roy. I thought it was going to bother me that they were changed but it turns out this way worked really well. They were funny to look at because they were all the same guy (even as Doris). One big problem though: the O-L's song's were different in a bad way. They had these complicated musical numbers that were hard to understand so the lessons they taught so well in the previous movie were lost in this version. The dreaded tunnel scene was also changed for the better in my opinion. Some may like the original. They are wrong. Also the ending is completely different as they added much more of a second storyline with Willy Wonka. I liked it better than the original ending.

To sum up: I think I enjoyed this movie better than the original. The changes were either insignificant (like Charlie having a dad) or improved (everything else). It's still a kid-friendly movie that made me laugh out loud several times. But if you see it, try not to expect too much. You'll like it better if you are pleasantly surprised rather than disappointed.