Movie: Alice In Wonderland
Genre: Fantasy
Review Category: Movie Showing in Theaters
I was so utterly disappointed with this film, I don't know where to begin. I'll spare you the witty intro this time around and dive right into it and continue to dish dirt until I've aired all my grievances. Spoiler alert: I will ruin this film for you, if you haven't seen it, and wish to, please do so before reading further.
The plot to this film is weak and unimaginative (I know, odd for a movie that takes place in a land of fiction). The film takes place thirteen years after Alice's first tumble down the rabbit hole, which, is a departure from both of the Lewis Carroll books "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" and "Through the Looking Glass, and What Alice Found There", which both take place when Alice is seven. Meaning the brain team behind this 2010 version of the film had free liberty to reinterpret our idea of wonderland and it's inhabitants, and give us something truly amazing and out of this world. They also had free reign to come up with a completely differing plot from the books. Instead, they chose to give us the same old characters we know from the books and animated films, and place them in a setting that was, well, dull and lack luster (and that's being nice). The movie's lighting was un-expectedly dark, and the colors didn't pop, the scenery overall was very drab. And on top of that they hacked into both books and pieced together elements from each to create the film instead of taking the time to give us something new (which I'd assume would be the point of doing an Alice In Wonderland film with a grown Alice).
Secondly both big names attached to this project failed to hit the mark. The "Big Star" of the film, The Mad Hatter (played by Johnny Depp) was so unimpressive it literally hurt to watch him on screen. I have no idea on this earth why Tim Burton would take the Hatter character in this direction. To illustrate that the Hatter was actually "Mad," Depp would ramble inaudibly in what sounded like a Scottish accent fifty percent of the time, and speaks in a soft voice with a lisp the other fifty percent. The problem is between the thick accent and the lisp you can't make out what he's saying throughout most of the film. What's worse, the character isn't funny or even eerie, as I'd expect from a Burton directed film. His "Mad" rants weren't nearly dark enough and his lighthearted and playful actions weren't outlandish enough. He was more awkward than anything, not fully committing to one emotion or another.
I couldn't help but get the sense the film didn't know who its' audience was suppose to be. The dialogue was mild enough to give it a PG rating, but the themes of death, marriage, and violence centering this film are hardly appropriate for a child. And since the film was written and performed to meet child guidelines (to attain a PG rating), it makes the emotion achieved and tone of the film come off false. This film would have really benefited from being rated PG-13. At the end of the day this is a film based on a child's book, with adult themes, that was shot for the tween market (thanks Harry Potter). So in no way is it really a child's movie, and it shouldn't have been written to meet children's standards. That's what's made the Harry Potter franchise so successful, they take these "children's" stories and make films for a more mature audience.
Next, the film isn't that believable. And yes I am fully aware this is a fictional story based on a fictional novel, but in every good fictional tale there is some reason or explanation for a person being able to do amazing feats. My case in point is the climax of the movie where Alice faces off against a "Jabberwocky", basically a dragon that spews purple rays instead of fire, and is victorious. On screen when a child faces a fictional "bad ass" like a dragon, with no special abilities or training, and emerges the victor without a scratch; we can just chalk that up to a child's wild imagination and them being able to do whatever they want to in their minds. But when a woman of nineteen or twenty does this, something just doesn't ring "true".
Lastly I implore Hollywood to stop making 3-D films, leave that to the theme parks, aquariums, and museums please. In order to write from an unbiased view point, I did not watched Alice in Wonderland in 3-D (and if you don't believe that then I just didn't want to spend the extra cash). However, there were a few scenes you could tell were added just because they'd look good in 3-D. Now, adding frosting to the cake is always appreciated, but the cake has to taste good first. In other words I'd have appreciated it if Burton didn't add scenes simply because they'd look good in 3-D, and focused more on producing a great film. This movie had too many flaws for extra attention to be paid to how scenes would appear in 3-D. In fact that extra attention detracted from the 2-D viewing experience. Scenes that look good in 3-D, simply appear over-embellished for what translates on screen to be no reason at all in a 2-D format. So given that I really can't say a good word about this film, I rate it Catch if your in the Mood. And even though it's not on DVD yet for future reference, I rate it A Waste of Plastic.
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