Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory

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For 2005 film adaption see Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory
Original theatrical poster
Directed by	Mel Stuart
Produced by	David L. Wolper Stan Margulies
Written by	Roald Dahl David Seltzer (uncredited)
Starring	Gene Wilder Jack Albertson Peter Ostrum
Music by	Anthony Newley
Editing by	David Saxon
Distributed by	Paramount Pictures (theatrical), Warner Bros. (later)
Release date(s)	June 30, 1971
Running time	96 minutes
Country	United Kingdom United States
Language	English
Budget	$2.9 million
Gross revenue	$4 million

Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory is a 1971 film loosely based on the 1964 Roald Dahl novel Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. It starred Gene Wilder in the title role, and was directed by Mel Stuart. The film received an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Score.

[edit] Plot

Charlie Bucket is a poor boy living with his widowed mother and four bedridden grandparents in a tiny, ramshackle house; Mrs. Bucket works in a laundry while Charlie supplements the meager family income by delivering newspapers after school. The family, along with the rest of the world, learns that the famously reclusive chocolate maker, Mr. Willy Wonka, has hidden five Golden Tickets amongst his billions of Wonka Bars. The finders of these special tickets will be given a full tour of his world-renowned candy factory — the inner workings of which are a tightly kept secret — along with a lifetime supply of chocolate. Charlie wanted to take part in the search, but could not afford to buy vast quantities of chocolate like most other participants. Four of the tickets were soon found by Augustus Gloop, an overweight German boy; Veruca Salt, a spoiled British girl; Violet Beauregarde, a gum-chomping American girl; and Mike Teevee, a television-obsessed American boy (and in each case the same strange bespectacled man is seen whispering something to each of the four winners). Charlie's hopes seemed finally dashed when news broke out that the final ticket had been found by a Paraguayan millionaire (photographs in the newscast and newspapers were that of Martin Bormann).

The next day, as the Golden Ticket craze dies down, Charlie finds a silver coin in a gutter and uses it to buy a Wonka Bar. Simultaneously, word then spreads that the millionaire's ticket was a fake. Charlie opens the bar to find the true final ticket, and races home to tell his family but is stopped by the same man who had been seen silently talking to the other four winners. The man introduces himself as Arthur Slugworth, a rival confectioner who offers Charlie ten-thousand stacks of money in exchange for a sample of Wonka's latest creation, the Everlasting Gobstopper (a hard candy that can be sucked forever without dissolving), which was the same deal that he silently made to each of the other Ticket winners.

An excited Grandpa Joe manages to get out of bed in order to serve as Charlie's tour chaperon. The very next day, Wonka greets the children and their guardians at the factory gates and leads them inside, requiring each to sign a contract before the tour can begin. Inside is a psychedelic wonderland full of chocolate rivers, giant edible mushrooms, lickable wallpaper, other ingenious inventions and candies, and Wonka's workers, the small, orange-tinted, green haired men known as Oompa-Loompas. However, as the tour progresses, each of the first four children misbehave against Wonka's warnings, resulting in serious consequences. Augustus is sucked through a chocolate extraction pipe system and into the Fudge Room after trying to drink from a chocolate river. Violet transforms into a giant blueberry after trying a problematic experimental piece of Three-Course-Dinner Gum. Veruca and her father are rejected as "bad eggs" and sent plummeting down a garbage chute in the Chocolate Golden Egg Sorting Room after Veruca unsuccessfully tries to get her father to buy her one of the egg-laying geese, and then attempting to take one for herself. Mike is shrunk down to only a few inches after being transmitted by "Wonkavision," a broadcasting technology that can send objects through television instead of pictures. The Oompa-Loompas sing a song after each mishap, describing that particular child's poor behavior.

Charlie also succumbed to temptation along with Grandpa Joe, as they stayed behind in the Bubble Room and sampled Fizzy-Lifting Drinks. They began floating skyward and were nearly sucked into a ceiling mounted exhaust fan. To avoid this grisly fate, they both burped repeatedly until they returned to the ground. Wonka initially seems completely unaware of this incident.

The assumption was that Charlie had won the grand prize after he becomes the last remaining child on the tour. However, Wonka politely dismissed them and hastily disappeared into his office. Grandpa Joe and Charlie, suspicious that something was up, entered Wonka's office (every single item there was cut in half) to investigate. Grandpa Joe asked about Charlie's lifetime chocolate supply prize, and Wonka flatly informed him Charlie doesn't get the prize anymore because he broke the rules.

Puzzled, Grandpa Joe denied seeing any rules, and Wonka irritably pointed out the forfeiture clause of the contract Charlie and the other four ticket winners had signed at the start of the tour. Charlie was ineligible for the grand prize due to his part in the theft of the Fizzy-Lifting Drinks and bumping into the ceiling, which Wonka said "now has to be washed and sterilized" and would receive nothing because of the violation of the contract. Wonka furiously dismissed them both.

Grandpa Joe became livid at this development, severely denounced Wonka as a crook, cheat and swindler for building up Charlie's hopes and then smashing all his dreams to pieces, and vowed to give Slugworth the Gobstopper in revenge. Charlie, however, could not bring himself to betray Wonka and quietly left the candy on his desk.

Wonka recanted his penalty, begged his guests' forgiveness and revealed that "Slugworth" is actually an employee named Wilkinson, and that his offer to buy the Gobstopper as "Slugworth", served as a test for Charlie and the other kids; and Charlie was the only one who passed.

Charlie's lifetime chocolate supplie was reinstated, but that was only the beginning. As the trio soar over the village in the "Wonkavator," an airborne, multidirectional glass elevator, Wonka tells Charlie that his actual jackpot is the factory itself, as the Golden Ticket search was conceived to help Wonka search for an honest and worthy child to be the heir to his chocolate empire. Charlie and his family will now reside in the factory, and eventually take over its operation. As the Wonkavator sailed off into the sky, Wonka tells Charlie, "Don't forget what happened to the man who suddenly got everything he always wanted ... he lived happily ever after."

[edit] Cast

[edit] Production

[edit] Preproduction

The idea for adapting the book into a film came about when director Mel Stuart's 10-year-old daughter read the book and asked her father to make a movie out of it, with "Uncle Dave" (producer David L. Wolper) producing it. Stuart showed the book to Wolper, who happened to be in the midst of talks with the Quaker Oats Company regarding a vehicle to introduce a new candy bar from their Chicago-based Breaker Confections subsidiary (since renamed The Willy Wonka Candy Company and sold to Nestle). Wolper convinced the company, who had no previous experience in the film industry, to buy the rights to the book and finance the picture for the purpose of promoting a new Quaker Oats Wonka Bar.^[1]

It was agreed that the film would be a children's musical, and that Dahl himself would write the screenplay.^[1] However, the title was changed to Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory in order to promote the aforementioned candy tie-in, and also because of the United States' continued involvement in the Vietnam War at the time; "Charlie" was a nickname for the Viet Cong.^{[citation needed]}

Screenwriter David Seltzer conceived a gimmick exclusively for the film that had Wonka quoting numerous literary sources, such as Arthur O'Shaughnessy's Ode, Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest, and William Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice. Seltzer also worked Slugworth (only mentioned as a rival candy maker in the book) into the plot as an actual character.^[1]

Dahl, who had rights to the film production, unsuccessfully pushed for Spike Milligan to play Willy Wonka.^[2] His next choice, Ron Moody, rejected the part. Jon Pertwee also turned down the role due to ongoing commitments to Doctor Who. Also initially considered was Broadway star Joel Grey, who ultimately was rejected due to his small physical stature. Auditions were held for a week in New York City's Plaza Hotel, where Gene Wilder was immediately awarded the role. Wilder said that he would only do the movie if Wonka first appeared onscreen coming out of the factory hobbling with a cane, only to then lose it and do a somersault. Further auditions were held in New York, London and Munich to fill the parts of the other children and their parents.

[edit] Filming

Filming commenced on August 31, 1970 and ended on November 19, 1970. The primary shooting location was Munich, because it was significantly cheaper than filming in the U.S., and the setting was conducive to Wonka's factory. Stuart also liked the ambiguity and unfamiliarity of the location. External shots of the factory were filmed at the Munich Gaswerks; the flats and clocktower still exist.^[3] The closing sequence when the Wonkavator is flying above the factory is footage of Nördlingen in Bavaria, Germany.

Production designer Harper Goff centered the factory around the massive Chocolate Room. The two-foot deep chocolate river and waterfall were created by adding chocolate ice cream mix to 150,000 gallons of water, which eventually created a foul odor that permeated the entire soundstage. In the meantime, Quaker Oats had abandoned the production of their version of a Wonka Bar after several failed attempts.

[edit] Reception

Willy Wonka was released on June 30, 1971, and earned a positive response from moviegoers, but box office figures were less than desirable due to lack of promotion. As a result, it was the fifty-third highest grossing film of the year in the U.S., earning approximately $4 million, equivalent to about $17.4 million in 2009^[4]. Even though the film received positive reviews from critics such as Roger Ebert^[5] and Wilder would later earn a Golden Globe nomination for his performance, Dahl was displeased with the final product and refused to sell the rights to the sequel, Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator.^{[citation needed]} Seeing no significant financial advantage, Paramount Pictures decided against renewing its distribution deal for the film when it expired seven years later. Quaker Oats sold its share of the rights to Warner Bros. for $500,000 in 1977.

By the mid-1980s, Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory had experienced a spike in popularity thanks in large part to repeated television broadcasts and home video sales. Following a 25th-anniversary theatrical rerelease in 1996, it debuted on DVD the next year, allowing it to reach a new generation of viewers. The film was released as a remastered special edition on DVD and VHS in 2001 in order to commemorate the film's 30th anniversary. It is now considered a classic, with Gene Wilder's performance being hailed as one of his greatest roles.

[edit] Home Video

The first DVD was released in 1997 "25th anniversary edition"^[6] as a double sided disc containing a widescreen and "standard" version. The standard version actually had the widescreen mattes removed and contains information never meant to be seen by the film's creators.^[7] The standard version is not "pan&scan". This version of the disc has become rare.

A special edition DVD was released in 2001, celebrating the film's 30th anniversary, although only full-screen, on August 28, 2001. Due to the lack of a letterboxed release, fan petitioning eventually led Warner Home Video to issue a widescreen version on November 13, 2001. It was also released on VHS, with only one of the special features (a making of feature). Several original cast members reunited to film documentary footage for this special edition DVD release. The two editions featured restored sound, and better picture quality. In addition to the documentary, the DVD included a trailer, a gallery, and audio commentary by the cast.

In 2006, Warner Bros. released the film on HD DVD with all the bonus features from the 2001 DVD.^[8]

The movie will be available on Blu-Ray Disc on October 20, 2009.^[9] It will include all the bonus features from the 2001 DVD and 2006 HD-DVD as well as a 38-page book.

[edit] Music

	"Pure Imagination" (performed by Gene Wilder) One of the most well known songs from the film, the song can be heard while the five children and their parents explore the chocolate room at the factory, and is performed by Gene Wilder.
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The Academy Award-nominated original score and songs were composed by Leslie Bricusse and Anthony Newley, and musical direction was by Walter Scharf. The soundtrack was first released on Paramount Records in 1971.

The music and songs in the order that they appear in the film are:

1. "Main Title" - Instrumental medley of "(I've Got A) Golden Ticket" and "Pure Imagination"
2. "The Candy Man Can" - Aubrey Woods
3. "Cheer Up, Charlie" - Diana Sowle
4. "(I've Got a) Golden Ticket" - Jack Albertson and Peter Ostrum
5. "Pure Imagination" - Gene Wilder
6. "Oompa Loompa, Doompa-Dee-Do" - The Oompa Loompas
7. "The Wondrous Boat Ride"/"The Rowing Song" - Gene Wilder
8. "I Want It Now!" - Julie Dawn Cole
9. "Ach, so fromm" (alternately entitled "M'appari", from Martha) - Gene Wilder

[edit] Miscellany

• Harry Connick, Jr.'s 2001 Grammy-winning album, Songs I Heard, featured covers of "Pure Imagination", "The Candy Man", "Golden Ticket", "I Want It Now," and "Oompa Loompa."
• Willy Wonka was ranked #74 on Bravo's 100 Scariest Movie Moments for the "scary tunnel" scene.^[10]
• The film was included in Danny Peary's Cult Movies vol. 2 in 1983.

[edit] References

[edit] Further reading

• Anders, Lou. Golden Tickets to Hell: Willy Wonka – Tour Guide of the Abyss, 2005. http://louanders.blogspot.com/2005/04/golden-tickets-to-hellwilly-wonka-tour.html
• Stuart, Mel, with Josh Young, Pure Imagination: The Making of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, St. Martin's Press, 2002. ISBN 0-312-28777-1, ISBN 0-312-35240-9

[edit] Notes

[edit] External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory

• Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory at the Internet Movie Database
• Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory at Allmovie
• Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory at Rotten Tomatoes
• Veruca Salt's memorabilia from the original Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory film"