Narrative + Logic + Conflict + Wonderland = Disaster

Rating: 4/10 (9 March 2010)

Before getting into any details as to why I left the cinema with confusion and disappointment, I want to start with what I perceive as the best argument why this movie sucks: I saw it at an Sunday afternoon screening, so the cinema was filled with kids at all ages, accompanied by their parents. And during the whole length of the film, I didn't hear a single child laugh or giggle. I didn't laugh myself either, for that matter, but how bad must a children's movie really be if it completely misses its target audience? I mean, it's not like kids have that high standards.
And I would have never believed that I would hold this against a film, but WHY did they feel the urge to suffocate this wonderful piece of fiction under this concrete-like "story" whose pseudo-Christian undertones were lifted straight from the Chronicles of Narnia? Why must sweet little Alice become a soldier and killer for the suppressed inhabitants of Wonderland? Why must every character get a "real" name, every piece of magic (like the "eat me"-cookies) be explained with alchemy, every place get a name and a location that is reachable by just... walking there. Any coherent narrative demands logic - but this logic contradicts everything that Wonderland used to be about.
I have read the source material numerous times (both translated and in its original form), and again and again I was fascinated by its surreal magic, its emphasis on twisted anti-logic (Lewis Carroll aka Charles Dodgson used to be professor for mathematic and a dean in the local church, so he used the books as both an outlet for his more crazy thoughts and to praise the innocence of a child's mind) and its beautifully incorporated themes - like the idea, that the seconds books story unfolds like a game of chess.
But this is "Wonderland: Revolutions", and Alice, now a young woman, must go to war, learn that "Underland" (?) is indeed a real place, and the only way to get home is not to just wake up, but to kill a towering demon, as... it was prophecied, I guess.
Tim Burton didn't seem to have any idea what he wanted to add to the Alice-myth that hadn't been done before, so he constantly shifts back and forth between a nice children's movie in the tradition of the original Disney-movie and a dark, psychological thriller à la "American McGee's Alice", without ever reaching the quality or comitment of either of them.
The only redeeming factor in this CGI-crap is, of course, the acting. Helena Bonham-Carter plays the Red Queen (or better, the Queen of Hearts, the screenwriters screwed that one up, too), and she seems to have the time of her life. She was the only character in the whole flick that made me smile, once or twice. Both Crispin Clover and Mia Wasikowska play their parts decent and nuanced enough, considering what's going on around them. Especially newcomer Wasikowska plays the confusion and hidden inner strength of her character quiet niece and subtle, and I'm looking forward to seeing her in a really good movie. Anne Hathaways White Queen was also noteworthy for her fragility and confined madness.
But, yeah, this is, after all, a Johnny Depp-flick, and I guess he had it coming to damage his exceptional career by blindly trusting into Disneys Paychecks and Burtons.... whatever it is these two guys have in common. It's unbelievable! Here we have the same guy who played ingeniously Hunter S. Thompson and Jack Sparrow and Willy Wonka; he plays the quintessential MAD figure of western culture... yet he is easily out-acted by a CGI-cat. A few years back, the computer animated tears in The Lord of the Rings urged me to make some cynical remarks about the future of acting - but here we have an actor's whole performance depending on the photo-shopping done to his eyes. And, well, a wardrobe and make-up which even Ziggy Stardust wouldn't have worn in his weirdest times.
So, to sum it up: Its a shame watching this material and those actors going to waste for the sake of a "narrative" that no one would have missed. It fails as "dark" fantasy film, and, what's worse, it fails as a children's story.
The most depressing thought I had after leaving the cinema was: How many parents must have felt relieved that they never read this "crap" to their children?
Now I know how it must have felt to be a Transformers-fan.