Screened Out – Alice Through the Looking Glass

[two-star-rating]Johnny Depp, Mia Wasikowska, Helena Bonham Carter, Sacha Baron Cohen, Anne Hathaway, Alan Rickman[/two-star-rating]

It’s the same complaint as the first Alice – the last one directed by Tim Burton, this one produced by him. Lewis Carroll’s original characters are always so much more interesting – and much, much more absurd – than this. To use such colorful personalities to tell such a dour, boring story is a crime.

Off with their heads!

Though the costumes and visuals are exciting - and actors like Helena Bonham Carter seem to be having fun - a boring, basic story kills any joy for the audience.
Though the costumes and visuals are exciting – and actors like Helena Bonham Carter seem to be having fun – a boring, basic story kills any joy for the audience.

There’s no doubt the film is visually stunning, if that’s all some people want. The costumes are luxurious and slightly silly, and the setting is sumptuous and weird. The characters look unreal. However, this story is about as basic as you can get.

After sailing the world captaining her dead father’s ship, Alice comes back to London. There she finds that he one-time beau has undermined her financial security. He’s gotten her mother to sign over the house. If Alice doesn’t exchange her dad’s ship for the house – and take a job as a desk clerk – the family will lose everything.

Of course, Alice is infuriated with her wimpy, traditionalist mother!

Before Alice can decide what to do, though, one of her friends from Wonderland leads her through a mirror. In that magical land, the Mad Hatter (Depp) is sad. He’s sure his family is still alive, and he needs Alice’s help in finding them. This requires her to travel back in time, battle the Red Queen again, and patch up old wounds.

One of the gimmicks is that Time is a character (Baron Cohen). He’s actually crushingly dull, a masochist in love with the Red Queen.

Sasha Baron Cohen has been having no luck whatsoever is moving his movie career forward.
Sasha Baron Cohen has been having no luck whatsoever is moving his movie career forward.

In stealing a machine that travels through time, Alice jeopardizes all of existence – for reasons we don’t understand.

The Red Queen (Bonham Carter) wants to also go back in time, to the day her head became so large. She hopes to avoid that fate and wrest power away from her tedious sister, the White Queen (Hathaway).

For all the visual panache, what this movie is really missing is derring-do. There is none of Carroll’s wild sense of druggy experimentation. Our eyes may be dazzled, but our brains remain un-tickled.

I mean, did we really need yet another film about patching up relations with our families before it’s too late? And if we did, did it really need to use Alice in Wonderland characters?

[rating-key]

Writer Linda Woolverton waters this one down like she did the last one. Director James Bobin cannot find the same magic he spun in the last two Muppet movies.

Carroll was a master at absurdity. However, making his wild, twisted world into something this uninspiring makes no sense at all!

More in Film

See More