A closer look
Tim Burton flat-out refused to use computer-generated imagery for the nut-sorting sequence in his 2005 adaptation of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, instead forcing the production to train forty live rescue squirrels to actually crack and sort walnuts on camera. For ten grueling weeks, a team of professional animal handlers worked exclusively on teaching these hyperactive rodents how to properly sit on tiny stools, tap nuts, and drop them onto a conveyor belt. It is a stunning display of directorial stubbornness that likely cost millions of dollars and countless hours of frustration just to achieve a mildly unsettling visual effect that most viewers assumed was fake anyway. Nothing quite says Hollywood excess like employing an army of literal woodland creatures to perform a mundane labor task just because the eccentric guy in the tinted glasses hates green screens
