WONKA Review- Timothée Chalamet shines in chocolate factory prequel

The film is a work of magic with it’s unashamedly sweet-toothed musical numbers and script imagining the formative years of Roald Dahl’s chocolatier.

Anything involving Simon Farnaby and Mathew Baynton is going to be worth a watch. The songs, the dancing and the storyline brought a lot of fun, and pure amazing casting – spotting cast pop up from the Paddington films, the west end and renowned names.

Timothée Chalamet strikes a charming, earnest tone in bringing to life a character who has already been played to perfection. Playing tribute to both previous versions of Willy and drawing the audience in to the dream Wonka had of having his own chocolate shop. Despite the numerous ties back to Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory – mostly in the form of recognisable quotes – Chalamet’s performance is never far away to linking to Wilder as well as a sense of his own personality into the role.

Wonka is a movie that celebrates uniqueness, and Wonka’s dreams of sharing his confections with the world ends up threatening the status quo for the “Chocolate Cartel”, a trio of wealthy rival candymen led by Slugworth (Paterson Joseph) who believe sweets should be simple, cheap to produce, and unable to make you fly. As functionary antagonists, Joseph, Matt Lucas, and Mathew Baynton keep things moving with amusing mustache-twirling, chocolate eating and dancing. They hoard chocolate in vaults to drive up prices and wretch upon hearing the word “poor”.

Olivia Colman’s Mrs. Scrubbitt is perfect in every scene she’s in, and the predatory landlady’s romantic entanglements with Mr. Bleacher (Tom Davis), provide the movie’s biggest laughs. Mrs. Scrubbit has a habit of tricking guests of her boarding house into working for them – that’s the last time Willy forgets to read the terms and conditions!

Keegan-Michael Key’s police chief, who gets increasingly bigger and greedier with every chocolate bribe he takes from the “Chocolate Cartel”. A police chief who knows he shouldn’t be doing wrong, but is too indulged in the taste of the chocolate at hand.

As a whole the charming and well-staged musical numbers give the movie a spark in your brain when leaving the cinema, don’t forget if you start to float after eating chocolate, it will fade but you may need to burp and fart your way back down. And never give up on your dreams.

p.s – The Zoo’s guards love story was a stand out memory…