It’s been many years but I am finally getting to rewatch the Chitty Chitty Bang Bang film. I can tell you right now, this is not a film that has aged any better than the first time around. There’s barely a plot going on here and the film just never manages to capture your attention. I have to admit that it was probably better before the film went into dream world and even then the intro wasn’t all that great. It’s a rare mix of a lot of old time story telling devices that just failed at the same time.

The film starts off by introducing us to Mr. Potts who is a really crazy inventor who also happens to be extremely defensive at all times. Quite the impressive combo of traits eh? Well, one day he ends up meeting a lady named Truly who considers him to be a real bore. He doesn’t take proper care of his kids and is far too aloof. Potts rejects all of that and may be right because he immediately wins her over to the point where she’s grinning and laughing less than 10 minutes from their meetup. Potts even works on selling some whistle candies to her father although that doesn’t end up going so well.

Potts tries a bunch of other crazy inventions like an automatic hair cutter and even rebuilds a car. It’s still rather bumpy so he calls it Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. Quite the name eh? Well, this is a perfect time to tell a story about some corruption among the rich and a fantastical kingdom where pirates are trying to steal the car. CCBB is a very unique car after all that can even turn into a boat. It’s all really crazy but can Potts impress Truly enough for them to get married?

Now this film is in an interesting position with the humor. For example, it does have a lot of slapstick and goofy humor with all the characters running around. It’s pretty direct and in your face which is usually a humor style that I rather enjoy quite a lot. That being said, it felt like the film was missing the punchline half the time. You have all the setup for a bunch of jokes but then they all just go through the motions.

The film is also a musical which doesn’t really work out well. As with most musicals, the songs just aren’t all that great. The songs aren’t super bad or anything but none of them are the kind that you will be humming along to. The funniest part of them is really just to enjoy the scenes ironically. This is a pretty good film to watch ironically like if you view it as a super serious product and then go from there. That has its limits though and doesn’t make it a super strong film.

The romance is also not going to be one of the better ones and this is pretty much self evident. It’s hard to see how Truly goes from finding Potts to be super annoying and unlikable to being in love with him shortly afterwards. In context it’s not even like they knew each other a super long time. He was telling a story for a good chunk of the time after all and there weren’t any big time skips to where they were hanging out for a few months or something. She was won over way too quickly.

Yes, this is a comedy film but I don’t think that works as an actual defense here. You still could have had slower pacing and allowed for things to work out gradually. Or just have Potts be likable from the start. Instead of being super defensive about the amount of freedom he gives his kids, have him apologize and admit that she was right. Then Truly understands how mature he is and things go well from there. That would be the easiest fix.

Okay lets talk about the story now. So the Baron wants the legendary Chitty Chitty Bang Bang car and so he has two bumbling agents constantly trying to get it. They try kidnapping Potts, then going after his father, etc. They don’t really know how to do anything so the heroes aren’t often in a lot of danger. Unfortunately the two biggest liabilities are Pott’s two kids. They don’t have much of a concept of stranger danger and so they run into a van for some candy. They pretty much write the book on why I tend to find kids annoying in this kind of adventure.

The whole story also feels like it takes place in the really olden days because of how the town and castle look. In fairness though, the film itself is fairly old so that was just how things went. There just isn’t really anything interesting to look at during the adventure. I also think this might be where I can better explain what holds the story back. It’s just too serious.

Now hear me out. This is a really silly comedy film so that may sound like I’m missing something. Where the story takes itself too seriously is in how the whole kingdom plot is still taking itself seriously even when the actual characters aren’t. We’re introduced to a whole new town with its own lore and the kingdom has a lot of backstory. You could maybe pull this off in a fully serious film but it’s much harder to do that when the characters don’t really care. You either needed to make this a fully serious film, or cut out the story aspect and just keep the film about everyone messing around and getting into trouble.

While the opening wasn’t ultra interesting, I do think the premise was better than the adventure we got. We could have stuck to seeing Potts and all of his crazy neighbors running around and causing trouble while Truly tries to expose them all as being crazy. I think you could do some crazy shenanigans with that or….make the car fully sentient. I think that would have been funny. Ultimately the film is fairly innocent and harmless but it’s just not doing anything. This one should probably not get a remake, I don’t think you can really save it.

Overall, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang is a film that just doesn’t work. Even after waiting over 10 years and watching it again…it’s just not entertaining. The fantastical approach didn’t work here and the characters were not strong enough to make up for this. I would highly recommend sticking away from this film. It’s not as if it does anything seriously wrong but at the same time you’re just not entertained which is a big blow against any film.

Overall 3/10