Dick Van Dyke reportedly said “This (CCBB) will out-Disney Disney”.
Hell, I first saw Chitty Chitty Bang Bang as an adult, and I get freaked out by that guy. And the set piece where the candy wagon transforms into the cage, I found absolutely harrowing.
I haven’t seen Chitty Chitty Bang Bang in years. I was more likely to be watching Bedknobs and Broomsticks. That said, I wouldn’t mind seeing it again.
Too long and discombobulated would be my verdict, though I do like Dick Van Dyke
I have nothing to say here, except that there’s a musical group calling itself Shitty Shitty Band Band.
I haven’t seen the movie since I was a kid, but I did let a girl drag me to see the stage version in London. Incredibly painful. Extremely cute-sified, terrible new songs added, and they tried to put more weight on the title song than it could bear (imagine that great catchy tune sung by a full chorus and orchestra in multi-part harmony sung at half the tempo, trying to make it sound dramatic or something – yech).
I will say I do like the songs in the original movie. The Sherman Brothers had an incredible knack for writing simple tunes out of a few basic chords that had the ability to lodge themselves in your brain. I envy that talent. Witness Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, Mary Poppins, The Jungle Book, and lots of other Disney stuff from the '50s and '60s.
I really really really really hate that movie, and I really wish someone would go back and do it right.
Prior comments:
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=7006349&highlight=chitty#post7006349
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=6666179&highlight=chitty#post6666179
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=5663682&highlight=chitty#post5663682
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=2534023&highlight=chitty#post2534023
(yes, it is getting to be an obsession)
Two hours and 24 minutes is a pretty long run time for any movie, especially a kids movie.
Did you watch the entire opening credit sequence? I showed this movie in a theatre once, the original opening credits were literally at least 10 mins, probably more.
As a young boy I was oddly facinated by Truely pretending to be a wind up doll.
As I remember there was an intermission when I first saw the movie as a kid. Back in the day when there Were intermissions.
I just realised that this movie is almost 40 years old. :eek: I was 6 and prime fodder for this flick. I haven’t seen it in years, but remember feeling it dragged for me as an adult. Thanks guys, you did stick a lot of songs back in my head…
Child Catcher=Very scary.
He was right. It’s quiute an achievment–an even longer, more annoying, bigger pile of crap than Mary Poppins
I somehow missed seeing this as a kid. Some friends of mine were discussing it when we were in high school, and since they knew I was a fan of Wizard of Oz, told me I’d love it (although they didn’t like it themselves). Years later, I saw it and was retroactively pissed off at them for thinking I’d like that pile of crap.
My kids claim they only like the part where the king is trying to kill the queen.
The things my (9 & 11 year old) kids liked about the film:
- The Old Bamboo stage number with hats, sticks and limbs flying everywhere.
- The Baron and his wife sound just like Oma & Opa and get along worse than Mom & Dad.
- People used to wear really funny-looking bathing suits.
They both rated it 2 1/2 stars - the identical rating they gave Hoot this past weekend.
Do yourself a favor: find and read the book.
As noted earlier, the movie bears absolutely no relationship to the book. The book is obviously Ian Fleming - gangsters, caves, explosions, tension, scary bits: it was one of my favorite books growing up, and I still enjoy it.
The movie is horrible - as Dick Van Dyke said, an attempt to out-Disney Disney. It breaks my heart whenever Ian Fleming is blamed for the movie, given that the movie and the book are two totally different animals.
I only saw the movie version once, and that was enough. Can’t remember, was the foursome a family (father, mother, son, daughter) as in the book? Or was it another case of ‘mother gone missing’ that seems to plague so many children’s films of that type, with the mother role filled by a friend/ teacher/ babysitter/ governess/accidental passenger/?
“Absolutely no relationship”? Perhaps exaggerating a bit here?
I find the annoyance of that song is countered if one imagines that Dick is singing about his dick.
Lyrics such as “lusciously eatable”, “A mouth full of cheer”, “Don’t waste your pucker on some all day sucker”, and “A bon-bon to blow on at last has been found” all alleviate the agony somewhat.
For what it’s worth, here’s my two cents on CCBB.
My parents took me to see this after it was first released. I remember that even though it was a long movie, there was enough going on to hold my interest during the entire running time (which, when you’re about 4 years old, is pretty much all you demand out of a film). Oddly enough, the Child Catcher didn’t bother me too much.
I didn’t see CCBB again until the first time it was on TV when I was 7. This time, I found the whole experience of watching the movie like being force-fed a large bowl of honey-glazed sugar cubes. I still wasn’t scared of the Child Catcher and, by now, thought he was rather creepily cool.
My opinion of CCBB hasn’t changed all that much since I was 7.
I always wondered why Caracatus Potts’ children and father all had british accents… and he did not.
I really have to dissent with you all. Chitty Chitty Bang Bang is one of my favorite Sherman Bros. movies. I even like it a bit more than Mary Poppins and way better than Bedknobs and Boring (don’t tell fenris) plus it doesn’t have any dated cartoon/real-life scenes. My favorite songs are Posh! and The Roses of Success, but the sound-track is pretty solid all the way through: the title track, Me Ol’ Bam-Boo, You Two, Toot Sweets, Hushabye Mountain, Doll On a Music Box. The only song I don’t like is Howes’ solo. To top it off, the kids do a good job not being annoying.
As for being too long – I guess it is. I have never seen it in one sitting. In fact, my kids are so freaked out by the Child Catcher and the Vulgarians, that we pretty much just watch the first half. The credits are definitely too long. I get impatient waiting for them to end, although my kids don’t seem to mind (ages 3, 4, and 4).
Can’t agree with this. He was a good impressionist, and his send-up of Roger Cook (an obnoxious New Zealander who came over to England to make money, and ended up as the worst type of “investigative journalist”, i.e. a self-promotion artist), dubbed Roger Crook, was very good indeed. He also did a passable Clive James, back when the latter was making a name for himself as a TV critic for The Observer.
Very few English comedians of that era - many of whom grew up in the vaudeville tradition - translated well to film. Surely Hill’s silly face and salute will still be remembered when all the alternative (I certainly prefer the alternative) comics of the 80s and 90s have been forgotten.
Nope. Excluding the names of some of the characters and the fact that the car could drive/fly/float, there’s no relationship whatsoever between the book and the movie.
And in the book, the car is sentient. And communicates (the car has a panel on it’s dashboard where it flashes words/phrases “Silly ass”, stuff like that). The book involved a plot by mobsters (Joe the Monster, Man-Mountain Fink and Soapy Sam) to blow up a bank (I think) in France. The kids get kidnapped by the bad-guys and their plan was foiled by the kids, the car and Father Christmas.
The movie involved a non-communicating, non-sentient (or at least only quasi-sentient) car, a fairy-tale kingdom, a child-catcher, the whole “toot sweet” bit, the evil baron and baroness, Truley Scruptious (in the book, Potts is married to Mimsey), the grandfather, etc.
In addition, the tone is completely different. The book has a Hardy Boys/James Bond action-adventure “boy’s adventure” feel. The movie is fairytale-ish.