Time flies but also plods in Alice Through the Looking Glass, the curiously frantic yet flatlining sequel to Tim Burton’s 2010 blockbuster Lewis Carroll reimagining. So you can imagine my excitement when I heard there was a second movie coming out.
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Alice Kingsleigh (Mia Wasikowska) is a bit older now and we first see her as the deeply unlikely captain of a ship under attack by pirates off the Strait of Malacca back in 1874, and she then arrives home to discover her Mum Helen (Lindsay Duncan) being held to financial ransom by that posh twat Hamish (Leo Bill). That honor goes to Sacha Baron Cohen as a new character, Time. Don’t believe me? Go ask Alice. He’s dying of sadness, ravaged by guilt that he and not the evil, jumbo-headed Red Queen (the ever-delicious Helena Bonham Carter) is responsible for the death of his family.
Alice’s adventure takes her all throughout Underland’s history and back to the real world once or twice to deal with her own issues.
The main problem is that the film severely over-estimates how much the audience care about Depp’s irritatingly shrill Mad Hatter, who is as hard to listen to as he is to look at. It even fills in a few plot holes in-between. Directed by James Bobin, from a screenplay by Linda Woolverton.
The aesthetic of Alice Through the Looking Glass is very colorful, but in the Tim Burton’s way. Through the Looking Glass seems to have a lighter color palate and much more comedy, but that doesn’t mean the stakes aren’t as high. (The Red Queen’s eye makeup has shades of the late, great Divine from “Pink Flamingos.”) On top of that, Baron Cohen’s performance as Time is just a Christoph Waltz impression stuffed inside one of Lady Gaga’s rejected costumes, and the less said about Hathaway’s overly affected and distracting hand acting, the better. This is a movie devoid of wonder and whimsy – a key element in any Carroll adaptation you would think.
A Lewis Carroll tale is once again taken to the big screen by Walt Disney Pictures: Alice Through the Looking Glass.
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“My goal was just to support him (James Bobin) if he needed any advice, if he wanted anything from me and just to help him facilitate what he needed to do”, Burton explained. There wasn’t any extra scenes at the end of the credits, but there were some things to look at during the beginning of the credits. “I have a file on my computer for each character I’ve played”. The movie assumes an investment that probably doesn’t exist, and yet we’re dragged through these relationships regardless, unable to ignore that Alice is destroying Time himself for the objective of cheering up the Mad Hatter.
