“Charlie vs. the Chocolate Factory” is ready to be unwrapped.
The first footage from the upcoming animated feature, which was directed by Elaine Bogan and Jared Stern and stars Kit Connor (as a new Chocolate Factory-adjacent Charlie) and Taiki Waititi (as Willy Wonka himself), was screened at the Annecy International Animation Film Festival ahead of its release in 2027. And it was pretty delicious.
In a combination of rough animation and mostly finished animation, you get a feel for the film and its characters. This time around, Charlie is a streetwise kid in modern London who, along with his buddies, is facing eviction. Together, they catch an ingenious plan to break into the titular Chocolate Factory and make away with a golden ticket. But what they don’t know is that Willy Wonka, who had gone to prison for turning a little girl into a blueberry, is out and is resuming his old shenanigans in his Chocolate Factory. And yes, there will be Oompa Loompas, only this time they are little, Minions-type creatures. We can see the merchandise already.
What was striking about the footage was that Willy Wonka seems genuinely menacing and a little creepy – or at least creepier than he has been in the previous incarnations, when he was portrayed by Gene Wilder, Johnny Depp and, most recently, Timothée Chalamet. These kids think that they’re going to make away with an easy score, but Wonka is going to really put them through it. It goes without saying that Waititi’s line-readings are fantastic. (He is also an executive producer on the project.)
There are a whole bunch of iconic locations that flash through the footage, including several instances of Charlie and Wonka interacting with the glass elevator, an element that was expanded upon in the sequel to the original novel, 1972’s “Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator.” (It was released the year after the Wilder film had become a sensation.) At one point in the footage, the glass elevator seems to pulsate and glow, recalling the TARDIS from “Doctor Who” more than anything else.
“Charlie vs. the Chocolate Factory” marks the biggest Roald Dahl-based project for the streaming giant since they acquired the Roald Dahl Story Company for $400 million back in 2021. There has been a collection of Wes Anderson short films based on Dahl stories, eventually collected into the anthology film “The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar and Three More,” and an animated feature based on “The Twits.” But this will be the streaming giant adapting and contemporizing one of the author’s flagship tales. Originally envisioned as a series, it was reformatted for a feature. Based on the footage, it seems like that was the right move.
“Charlie vs. the Chocolate Factory” looks like a very yummy feature indeed.
Get ready to visit Wonka’s Chocolate Factory in 2027.
