But I Don't Want To Go Among Dull People

Something has happened. I don't know if it really is the result of focus group evil or if it was truly an accident, but Alice in Wonderland is quite possibly the most vile formula picture I've seen in a theater. Top to bottom it's the safest possible picture that could have had $150 million dollars thrown its way. Let's go down the check list. Familiar source material that won't scare anyone? Check. Huge star? Check. Tiresome moral about being yourself? Check. Stock characters whose back stories were pasted into the script with stickers? Check. Epic battle finale? Check. Horrible love story jaw-droppingly crammed into the middle of the movie but not completed in a bizarre acknowledgment of the audience's horror? Check. 3D surcharge? Check.

Don't get me wrong, Tim Burton and I have a great relationship. Especially his early films. I love Pee-Wee's Big Adventure and Ed Wood, The Nightmare Before Christmas and Edward Scissorhands are the classic pieces of Tim Burton style that he has now beaten to death, and even some of his more recent films, like Sweeney Todd (based on my favorite musical, so, you know) and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory I liked more than I probably should have. But the recurring theme in his career is his inability to choose a script. When he stumbles into a truly great script, like Ed Wood, and assembles a great cast, like Ed Wood, there's no stopping him. His weakest efforts have always been his weakest efforts because of their poor script. Batman and Batman Returns have more script issues than I can count on my molecules, not to mention the fact that they hollowed out a Michael Keaton-sized action figure (only slightly larger than a normal action figure) and stuffed Michael Keaton in it, making Batman a statue that waddled everywhere. Oh no, it's Batman! but we can finish counting the loot first. He's all the way on the other side of the room.

Anyway, yeah, scripts. The worst crime Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland commits is to try and expand characters that are not only iconic, but were written specifically to work in the context of one setting, one scene, one set of dialogue. The Mad Hatter is the perfect example. What Burton and Depp and the writers do to that character is unforgivable. A truly bizarre character is makeup-ed to meet a studio focus group's definition of "weird", has all the edges shaved off by a hack screenwriter and is then given a dash of Johnny Depp's signature mannerisms and sets it out on a warmer to be lazily chewed by cow people. Here's the background to the Mad Hatter: He was a happy little hatter, and then the Evil Red Queen killed all his friends and now he's mad. He doesn't do anything especially mad, he just mostly talks about being mad.

Oh yeah, and the fucking Red Queen. I don't know if the Mad Hatter really the worst thing about this film. It may be the way the film takes all the vaguely defined characters of the book and uses whatever characteristics they can extrapolate to put them in the most formulaic roles. The Red Queen seemed sort of evil, so we'll make her a tyrant that must be toppled. The Caterpillar had a hookah. I think that makes him wise. The Cheshire Cat could disappear. Make him a superhero with the power to evaporate. The Doormouse had a sword, so she'll be an action hero. I could do this for all the characters. So I will. Alice is a young lady in late-Victorian England, so we'll make her stand up to the aristocracy and be herself and do absolutely mad things like wonder what it would be like to fly or become head of a trading company in an afternoon. Tweedledee and Tweedledum were argumentative weirdos, so let's make them comic relief bullshit. The White Queen is a benevolent ruler, presumably based on her name and nothing else. And Crispin Glover, oh my beloved Crispin Glover, is delegated to the most awful of villains, the Queen's right hand who has no mercy for the allegedly charming creatures of Wonderland.

How can Hollywood have no idea how to use Crispin Glover? While their target audience was people who wear shirts that say things like "normal people scare me" or call the "cool kids" (a mythical band of travelers I've never been able to find) sheep, they tried to net fans of the truly bizarre by casting Crispin Glover, and this isn't the first time that's happened. What will it take to get him another Willard?

Its use of 3D is probably more effective and coherent than it was in Avatar, but not by much. Coraline is still the all-time champion of the technology, and Alice in Wonderland's superiority to previous applications of the technology is simply a matter of money and time for R&D, not any major artistic achievement, and if there's anything we can give Alice in Wonderland credit for it's for having a lot of money behind it. Still, it's Tim Burton's ugliest film, looking not unlike a five-year-old's vomit after eating a box of crayons with that unmistakable CGI sheen rubbed on it (still, it's nowhere near as ugly as last year's A Christmas Carol). It's such a stark contrast to the gobstopping but gaudy beauty of Avatar that really shows that where Burton's talents and eye end, Cameron's stretch far beyond.

Its desire to puke all over the legacy of Lewis Carroll's books is sometimes admirable, and Tim Burton being a studio puppet is sometimes fascinating, and Johnny Depp turning himself into a saleable commodity is sometimes sad, but mostly I wanted to be one of the people in my sold-out audience smart enough to walk out of this film. I didn't because I wanted to see it through the end, but then something happened that was so nightmarish and unwatchable I had to cover my eyes. And the audience loved it. If you end up being dragged to this movie, try and figure out what it is. It's my gift to you, a small human kindness to make the experience endurable, but I hope to God you don't have to go through what I did.

1/10