Dear Reader,
When I went to see Alice in Wonderland, I had no expectations for it other than the kookiness portrayed in its trailer. And kooky it was, and often funly so. The Hatter’s tea party goers were as wonderfully disheveled as the Hatter’s suit was bizarre. And Johnny Depp, as the Hatter, spoke with an irresistable tongue-thrusting British accent. (I wish I could remember the boxer who talked with a tongue thrust.) And the White Queen, played by Anne Hathaway? Hmm… seems like she had fun floating her arms about, a la Captain Jack Sparrow times 3.
For the most part, I readily imbibed in Tim Burton’s spell.
But…
Then the jabberwocky showed up, and the spell was broken. It screamed the same annoyingly high-pitched scream as every other mucous-mouthed Komodo dragon creature since Alien II. Boring! I’d intended to slam the jabberwocky itself and say it was a cliche’, but then I saw the saw how it was illustrated in Lewis Carroll’s novel, and I had to back off. (It’s kinda the real thing.) Even so, something wasn’t right about about the jabberwocky scene. It felt like the fantasy movie went bonkers and turned sci-fi. Curiouser and curiouser.
Also but…
I greatly thought the Hatter’s futter-wack (a kind of happy dance, I guess) was dumb. Both the music and the worm dance it accompanied were jarringly out of character with the movie. Didn’t look real at all. I suppose that could have made it funny to some people. To me? Dumb.
I give the costume 5 stars, silliness 4, and the big head jokes 3 stars.
With Appreciation For Your Time,
The Editor
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