Karl und der Shokoladefabrik, and a Mournful Farewell

Tim Burton's kingdom is small, but he is the undisputed master of it. When you see a film with him in it you know basically what you're going to get and that there isn't a man alive (that I know of, at least) who does it better. Most of Burton's trademarks were apparent: flashbacks to childhood and their importance in shaping a person, the music-box and castrato choir, a bizarre post-industrial artform (and, indeed, a weird idea of industrialization), characters with little to no depth or transformation throughout the film (save in a transubstantiative sense - like Batman turning into Batman, or Willy Wonka doing what he does at the end), masks in and out of the context of Halloween, the outsider/anti-hero, blah blah blah.

I mean, I'm thinking of quite a few movies I've seen done by Tim Burton, and he incorporates each one in each film somehow. I can't think of a flashback in Pee Wee's Big Adventure .. unless the entire movie is a flashback to childhood.

With all this being said I don't like Tim Burton's films when I want to go see, say, a movie to evoke things in me, or when I want to feel intellectually compelled. His movies are almost like fairy-tales: easy to understand, entertaining, and with the ability to conjure wonderful worlds built almost entirely from Tim Burton's mind itself. Fairy tales are also allegorical as hell, preachy, full of weird-ass contraptions, and with main characters that's impossible to like (unless, of course, you don't like poor people). All of these are satisfied by the film, also. Helena Bonham Carter is also likeable because she's, well, her.

Burton does it well, as does Johnny Depp. The Oompa-Loompa songs don't - and that's when I could even discern the lyrics of the songs they were singing, which wasn't often. If you like what Tim Burton sells, you'll like this. If you don't then you won't (although, admittedly, I've never met someone that didn't like Tim Burton films for what they are).

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I'm doing this mostly because I don't think she'd want a separate entry about it, but a livejournal friend, someone with whom I was as close as Livejournal allows (but, besides being a friend, was a frequent commenter and source of inspiration in this journal - some of you have probably read her comments) left her pain behind yesterday. It struck me coreward and coldly (in that sense that when I read it I felt like my heart and stomach froze solid) because since I've known her she had had Stage 4 Colon Cancer and was optimistic through it ... until there was no reasonable reason to be optimistic. Then she rationalized everything in ways that must have required a titanic font of understanding and strength -- and, fairly suddenly (or as suddenly as Colon Cancer kills), she died. She only posted a few days ago - she was 32 years old and a teacher.

It really hit me deeply; I was trying to hold back tears for most of the day. I've met lots and lots of sick people and many of them ostomates (being who I am I have a particular affinity to finding them) - people that were young and old and of all types and metamorphs - and I've never, ever met someone who handled the cards with which they were dealt with the personality and biting sarcasm that she maintained.

To give you an idea of how wonderful a person she was: I'd never met her and it hurts me dearly to know she's gone. It's hurting me even more thinking about it ...