Do you suppose she's a wildflower?

I love Alice. I love Wonderland. I was the weird teenager who stayed home sick from school watching Disney's animated movie, as well as a VHS recording of the 1985 made for TV movie starring the likes of Carol Channing, Sammy Davis Jr., and Scott Baio. Who doesn't love a tap dancing Caterpillar and a drunken White Queen? It's as fabulous as it sounds. Alice's Adventures In Wonderland was the first book I read of my own free will. I'd get into why I love the story so much, but I really don't know you that well. Maybe another time.

So naturally I saw Tim Burton's version in 2010. I walked away feeling not totally wowed, but not entirely disappointed. Sort of how I feel after a visit to my gynecologist. Mia Wasi waka woobi  The actress who played Alice was fabulous. I loved her, and I adored Helena Bonhem Carter as the Red Queen. It was all very lovely, and I even stomached Johnny Depp doing his best impression of Jack Sparrow impersonating The Mad Hatter. (Whatever, Johnny. We get it. You play a good weirdo. Now go make a remake of a remake of Peter Pan, and get the hell out of Wonderland.)

Alas, Mr. Depp returned once more to reprise his role as The Hatter, but the plot line was all over the place. For once I was actually relieved when I had to leave the theater to take one of my kids to the bathroom.

Sacha Baron Cohen was thrown into the mix as Father Time. To sum it all up, Alice steals his time machine, which I kept hoping she'd program to take her to October 25, 1985. Instead she travels through the early years of Wonderland, chased by Father Time and not by Libyans. It's all very lame and predictable, and really not even worthy of a synopsis. The movie (finally) ends two hours later and Alice has short hair, because nothing quickly spells out a character transformation like a hair cut when the story itself fails to do the job. So there's that.

If it sounds like I'm not explaining it very well, it's because I hated it and can't for the life of me understand why someone would write a script so out of left field.

My main beef with this film is that it had no whimsy. There's barely a nod to the original story of Through the Looking Glass. The movie should have been called Borat Goes To Wonderland and Alice Goes To An Insane Asylum. I would have known to stay away, and I wouldn't be bitter enough to write this angry review on my blog that nobody ever reads. I'm just disappointed my beloved Alice was turned into a sci-fi heroine. I'm sure there's an audience for that, but I felt duped.

Meh.

Happy Memorial Day.

They liked it. But they just love going to the movies so I wouldn't go by their judgement.

She got an award for being the best 6 year old on the the planet...and for being the top kid in her math class and the top reader. My little nerd.

My strong friend. Glad we can be there for each other after all these years.

I'm so lucky to have met these girls over 25 years ago. EEk. 

20160514_093848.mp4 from Nikki Pollard on Vimeo.