A young chocolatier with dreams of opening his own shop arrives in a city famous for its sweets, only to clash with the established business cartel controlling the market through underhand means. Inspired by the works of Roald Dahl and 1971’s Willy Wonka And The Chocolate Factory, this playful fantasy prequel stars Timothée Chalamet as the eponymous Willy Wonka.
Classification Issues
- Violence
- A police officer ‘roughs up’ a man by dunking his head repeatedly in freezing water during a scene of mild comic violence. A little girl is casually kicked by her cruel guardian, but the blow does not appear to hurt her. Other scenes contain very mild slapstick violence such as comic knockout blows.
- Threat and horror
- Two people are forced at gunpoint into a vault which then rapidly fills with liquid chocolate, threatening to drown them; they remain calm, however, and do not come to harm. In a short scene, disgruntled shop customers start a riot, smashing up the shop and setting it on fire, but again no one is hurt.
- Language
- There is an implied, partial use of the term ‘arse’. Very mild bad language includes ‘damn’, ‘gosh’, ‘blasted’ and ‘jeez’.
- Additional issues
- There are very mild comic sex references and toilet humour, as well as some very mild upsetting scenes, including ones related to past bereavement.
Key classification issue: violence
Despite his gentle nature and good intentions, in one scene Wonka is accosted by the Chief of Police who has been ordered by the cartel to intimidate him. The policeman does so by dunking Wonka’s head repeatedly into a nearby fountain, and he is seen briefly struggling to breathe with his head under the water. As Wonka regains his composure, it is implied the policeman hits him over the head with a truncheon.
Despite the violent acts, the intensity of the scene is lessened by its humour. The policeman comes across as comically inept, at first delivering the verbal warning while Wonka’s head is underwater, meaning he cannot hear. The policeman apologises for his actions, and then threatens that if Wonka continues to sell chocolate in the town he’ll get “more than a bonk on the head”, before realising that he was supposed to say that after hitting Wonka on the head. He asks for Wonka to wait, and Wonka politely obliges while the policeman draws his truncheon and swings it towards Wonka. The scene cuts before the weapon makes contact, leaving the audience to imagine the blow rather than showing it.
The comic intent of the scene mitigates the strength of the violence we see However, dunking someone’s head underwater can be dangerous and the scene is nonetheless too detailed to be containable at U. However, the context and presentation means that we were able to classify the film PG for mild threat, violence, and implied bad language.
