‘Wonka’ review: A clever candy-man origin story starring Timothée Chalamet

The new “Wonka” works considerably better than its reasons for existence would suggest. It exists because, why not? It’s one more brand-familiar origin story, the easiest thing in the movie world to get made, requiring everything but a new idea.

It exists because it’s one more musicalization of nonmusical source material, adding seven original songs to a project attached to Roald Dahl’s 1964 novel “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.” The 1971 film version of that novel, with Gene Wilder as secretive candy magnate Willy Wonka, was likewise a musical; two of its more enduring tunes, “Pure Imagination” and the “Oompa Loompa” song, turn up in the latest screen addition to Wonkalore.

So where does it go right? Well, if you enjoyed either or both of the “Paddington” movies, particularly the second one, you’ll find “Wonka” a spiritually related cousin in its wit, bounce and general lack of aggravated charm assaults. Director Paul King and his “Paddington 2″ co-writer Simon Farnaby manage this little chunk of intellectual property quite well. And as Wonka, Timothée Chalamet lightens the load, delivering the majority of his lines in a style (to swipe a line from Cole Porter) classifiable as “murmuring low” and taking it easy.

We meet Wonka as a young, orphaned adult working as a ship’s cook, sailing into port eager to find his fortune in designer chocolates with a side of magic. The city is not London, but the geography and some details evoke the come-one-come-all London of the “Paddington” films, along with bits of Paris and other Euro-capitals.

In short order, sweet, trusting Willy runs afoul of a sinister laundress (Olivia Colman, making hay on apparent outtakes from a lost Mrs. Lovett “Sweeney Todd” audition). Her boardinghouse is really an enslavement camp for the unsuspecting; since he cannot read, Willy signs at check-in without reading the indentured-servitude fine print. So it’s up to him, his chocolatier ambitions and his fellow captives to bust out and make good.

Much of the film stays close to the nicely developed friendship between Willy and fellow orphan Noodle (Calah Lane). Outside the grim laundry confines, once Willy escapes and sets up shop, his nemeses multiply: There’s a trio of chocolate-cartel candy impresarios, plus a cop on the take played by Keegan-Michael Key, stuck uncomfortably inside the latex of a fat-phobic running gag.

The songs by Neil Hannon range from serviceable to serviceable with a smile. Hugh Grant may not be nearly as fun as he was in “Paddington 2,” but his dandified Oompa Loompa has its moments. And while “Wonka” overfills its slate with two or three escalating climaxes, the throwaway verbal jokes en route keep the contraption humming. (At one point Wonka reveals, breathlessly, that his latest fantastical chocolate treat has been “salted with the bittersweet tears of a Russian clown.”)

As with most franchise remakes or add-ons these days, “Wonka” comes with a wry streak of self-critique. The small orange Loompa, played by a digitally reconfabulated Grant, refers to his own theme song as “ruinously catchy.”

Charm can’t be quantified or made to work on everyone. Many critics find “Wonka” to be not charming — a typical example of medium-huge, $125 million production budget-level corporate screen mechanics in motion. Certainly there are elements of digital magic without a lot of magic. More happily, there’s the sight of Willy’s portable suitcase of chocolate-making wonder, a fine and eccentrically funny sight when fully opened.

Neither script nor actor have much interest in capturing hints of Wonka’s callous, misanthropic streak as imagined by Dahl and the earlier films’ interpretations. Since my childhood familiarity and partial affection for the wonky, clunky ‘71 “Willy Wonka” counts for only so much (the 2005 Tim Burton/Johnny Depp remake, even less), the new take won me over. Chalamet handles the musical demands with a sincere light tenor and some simple but nimble dance moves. The physical creations of the city exteriors and interiors look and feels like wood and brass and real-ish stuff, thanks to production designer Nathan Crowley (”The Dark Knight,” “The Greatest Showman”). And somehow, “Wonka” solves one of the sternest design challenges in all of cinema: Making a chocolate river look like something other than a Chicago wastewater treatment plant’s worst day ever.

“Wonka” — 3 stars (out of 4)

MPA rating: PG (for some violence, mild language and thematic elements)

Running time: 1:56

How to watch: Premieres in theaters Dec. 14

Michael Phillips is a Tribune critic.

mjphillips@chicagotribune.com

Twitter @phillipstribune