The Movie
Quite wisely, director Mel Stuart made the decision to make his adaptation of Roald Dahl's Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory timeless in its visual style. Wise because--and this might be hard to believe--the now-cherished family movie tanked at the box office upon its initial release in 1971. Really only upon TV airings and subsequent home video releases did it find its loyal and appreciative audience, which of course has inspired Warner to issue their latest Ultimate Collector's Edition.
The picture was financed by Quaker Oats, looking to launch a tie-in brand of chocolate bars, and so Stuart and his fellow filmmakers were not beholden to the usual studio meddling, freeing him to craft a story for the adults, really. The language is smart, the pacing brisk, and years later I'm still discovering little bits of comedic brilliance.
Four of the five kids who find Golden Tickets to gain entry to the mysterious Willy Wonka's factory are absolutely rotten, lending all-too-familiar realism and darkening the tone in an irresistible fashion. Wonka himself is messing with the children and their families from before he even meets them and throughout their tour, with a wanton disregard for their well-being. He's crazy, frankly, but to make him endearingly so required a fine actor like Gene Wilder, who made the part indelibly his own.
The heart of the film though is young Charlie Bucket (Peter Ostrum in his only role, ever), an unshakably good, kind boy surrounded by temptation, even evil, and yet his resistance to the corruptive forces of this world earn him a far grander prize than the lifetime supply of chocolate he was promised.
The Picture
Willy Wonka was released in a Blu-ray Book edition in 2009, but I don't believe that it was billed as a remaster, and neither is this, so I'm tempted to assume that we are looking at quite an old video transfer. The 16:9 image is soft in many shots, with lots of grain and noise, while the shadows can also degrade into lifeless shapes. But there are also many well-lit, carefully focused static shots actually look quite lovely, showing off the weave and detailing in the different costumes, even Gene Wilder's razor burn. Colors are also appropriately lush, notably in Wonka's vibrant purple coat. Boy could my wardrobe use one of those....
The Sound
Warner has given us a fine if unspectacular Dolby TrueHD 5.1 soundtrack, clean with mostly-perfect dialogue, and the occasionally illegible lines owing to performance or accents or the original recording. The track opens up a bit during the musical numbers, or when a real band is playing on screen. The slight enhancements for the surrounds are not especially engrossing though. It's not like we hear the wonders of the factory all around us, but then again the sound was never designed that way.
The Extras
There are a few treasures here, all ported from the 2001 DVD release. The audio commentary by all five "Wonka Kids"--Peter Ostrum, Julie Dawn Cole, Denise Nickerson, Paris Themmen and Michael Böllner captures the first time they have all watched the movie together, and we're able to join them. J.M. Kenny's half-hour "Pure Imagination: The Story of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory" ropes in star Gene Wilder and others for the most comprehensive retrospective ever.
We're also given a vintage 1971 featurette entitled "The Moviemakers," focusing largely on the contributions of production designer Harper Goff (four minutes), and four sing-along songs with scenes in 4:3 enhanced with enormous highlighted lyrics. All of the video extras on the Blu-ray are in standard definition.
Disc Two is a DVD of the movie with all of the above extras plus photos and cast/crew info. Disc Three, also a DVD, carries one new extra and one recently discovered. "Mel Stuart's Wonkavision" (13-and-a-half minutes) catches up with the director very recently in this cleverly executed program with different voices chiming in periodically. And
"A World of Pure Imagination" is another long-lost vintage featurette, this one running twelve-and-a-half minutes.
The box also includes a special reformatted copy of Mel Stuart's book, Pure Imagination, in addition to a Wonka-styled pencil tin with scented pencils and eraser. A packet of reproduced internal correspondence is alternately amusing and fascinating, providing tremendous insight into the production in only a few minutes. Particularly worth reading are Gene Wilder's thoughtful comments on his character's costume.
Final Thoughts
As someone who didn't own this movie on Blu-ray before, I'm pleased to be able to add it to my collection as a step up over my-ten-year-old DVD, in a few subtle ways. The elaborate packaging is fun (I think I'm going to have to hide those scented pencils from my kids), but the sweetest treat of all would have been remastered audio and video. Well, the Golden Ticket Anniversary is only a decade away.
Product Details
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