49 points til green! starting a job that gives me net access at work, all day- be prepared for a few...
49 points til green! starting a job that gives me net access at work, all day- be prepared for a few more reviews shortly! :)
Member since:26.05.2005
Reviews:9
I'm sure Roald Dahl never expected the fabulous character of Willy Wonka to be realised on screen by a heart-throb of our times. I've seen Johnny Depp's incarnation in the recent movie and I still haven't got over the very-odd-on-paper casting. Most great films have great books behind them, so I went scurrying back to Charlie and his exploits and read the book again before I went to the cinema.
Roald Dahl taps into the great Brothers Grimm tradition of story-telling. His most famous works are all a little dark, to say the least- people are squelched and squished, they eat worms, and, yes, they do die. No wide-eyed Disney fluffiness for Roald (the death of Mustafa in The Lion King was the first explicit screen death in a Disney feature- think about it).
So we have young Charlie Bucket, an essential decent little boy who lives happily on the breadline with his Mum and Dad and four elderly Buckets, in the awesome shadow of the Wonka Chocolate Factory. Charlie loves chocolate but his family are poor, and he gets but one bar a year, on his birthday. When Wonka announces that five lucky children will be allowed to visit his factory when they find one of the lucky Golden Tickets, chaos ensues. But not all the children are as lucky, or as worthy, as Charlie...
It's essentially a sweet little story (no pun intended) with a crisp moral edge that Dahl ties up with grotesquity and humour. Willy Wonka himself is a superbly absent, bizarre genius, with his own agenda, and he takes the pretty fairy tale where he wants. Given that Dahl, as a child, dreamed of creating the perfect sweet and being revered by Cadbury himself, Wonka is a creation close to his heart. The same can be said for the wide-eyed and admiring Charlie, the essence of 'good boys' everywhere. Dahl also lays bare, through the characters, his animosity for children who are spoiled and over-indulged in any way, and his wish that children would read more. His legendary stories have gone a long way to achieving that wish.
It's not a long book, but Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is one that everyone should read, in my opinion more than once. I think its best suited to children old enough to sit and read it quietly to themselves, as the rich language and descriptions will push their imaginations further than anything on the TV could. Time to imagine the scenes and action can be lost when you read to them.
A final note: the recent film is more adult-orientated than the Gene Wilder version, but still great for the kids. But gently nudge them into reading it first- affection for the story really helps you to appreciate the movie. Allow them to see if the film lives up to their imagination, not the other way around!
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