Chitty Chitty Bang Bang is a Film that I wish I would love as much as the general public does, but I can't seem to get there. Don't get me wrong, I can clearly see why it is a classic; the songs are fun (it’s the Sherman Brothers so of course!), the choreography is impressive, and the performances are energetic. A majority of my friends grew up with this film for the right reasons. But here's my problem with it; it is trying too hard to replicate too many previous classic movies, and not trying hard enough to be one of a kind. How shall I put it...? Imagine that you were building a car. In doing so, you use the engine of a Mercedes Benz, the tires of an 18 wheeler, and the body of a Smart Car (I'm sure the one mechanic reading this can draw a more specific example, so please forgive my lack of technical terms). You have the general pieces necessary to build automobiles, but these specific pieces do not fit together. They may all be of high quality, but if they don't go together then the result is going to be clumsy if not dysfunctional.
As I watched the film, I was not focusing on the progress of the nonsensical plot that went two miles east of All Over the Place; I was instead distracted by the films that Chitty Chitty Bang Bang seemed to wish it was. If you've read my blog before (all two of you), you're probably wondering why the fact that this film reminds me of other films is a bad thing while movies like La La Land and Moulin Rouge spectacularly get away with it. Well, what the latter films have in common is that they acted like throwbacks rather than original works. They were intentionally paying tribute to other movies by putting together a compilation of sorts, exploring what made us love previous films in their respective genres (La La Land with the classic Hollywood musical and Moulin Rouge to classic love stories and songs). They gave a point of view on what makes those genres timeless through technical, cinematic inspiration while never claiming they were original. Chitty Chitty Bang Bang does not explore what makes the films it replicates interesting, but instead combines a series of plot threads and song types without exploring anything about why they work. Their purpose is to hastily and illogically take the audience to random worlds that simply don’t fit together as well as they should.
Now don't get me wrong, the worlds are fun when they get their moment in the sun, and it even makes a few historical references in there if you are able to catch them. But the film felt like the result of a game of darts where the targets were various popular Disney movies at the time. I saw halfway explored versions of Mary Poppins, the Love Bug, The Parent Trap and possibly even more that I cannot reference. I took the time to read the movie's IMDB Trivia section afterward and discovered that that's not too far from the truth:
"Desperately wanting to emulate Mary Poppins in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (1968) in both tone and style, film producer, Albert R. Broccoli hired the same musical talents of Mary Poppins to work on the film: songwriters Richard M. Sherman and Robert B. Sherman, musical adapter/arranger/conductor Irwin Kostal, and choreographers Marc Breaux and Dee Dee Wood."
Broccoli even went so far as to attempt to team up Dick Van Dyke and Julie Andrews again.
Chitty Chitty Bang Bang had all of the great talent but little of the originality. There was potential in there for it to be a great film, it’s just out of reach. But while I did not fall in love with it, I can definitely see why a majority of the people who grew up with have. So enjoy it if you already do and maybe take a look if you have never seen it before. It’s still a fun little ride through the countryside even if it is bumpy.
