A kid's movie doesn't have to appeal only to kids; this has been proved many times, from Pixar flicks to Chicken Run to Harry Potter (the third one, in any case). Director Tim Burton has applied a childlike sensibility to adult(-ish) films in the past, so it was reasonable to expect his remake of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory to have something to offer to both children and sentient human beings. He does manage some striking images and some fun scenes, but the end result is disappointing: entertaining enough, but absolutely unaffecting and forgettable. Kids will gobble it up, and it's good to see some rather macabre imagery making its way to young impressionable minds, but then again, that's hardly something new these days. Burton has enough cache in Hollywood to get away with some welcome personal touches; some of the only emotional moments that ring true (however lightweight) come from Willie Woka's backstory, unexplored either in the book or in the original movie. Danny Elfman's score is, as always, excellent, and the cast is very solid. The musical numbers are embarrassing but fun, and seem grossly miscalculated (they spoof musical styles out of vogue about a decade before the movie's target audience was born). In fact, they are representative of the movie's attitude towards adults in the audience: to make a joke every now and then aimed at them, and then go straight back to the kiddie stuff. Almost as if it were apologizing.
Not a bad movie by any stretch, but not a particularly good one either. Definitely not as good as the talent behind it would suggest.
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