Alice Through the Looking Glass

Alice Through the Looking Glass is a movie that's been made with a great amount of care, but it simply is not very memorable.  It works well enough while you are watching it, is briskly-paced, and certainly never dull.  But as soon as it's over, you'll be hard pressed to remember much about it.  However, I felt the same way about 2010's Alice in Wonderland, and that movie went on to gross over a billion dollars at the worldwide box office.  Perhaps history will repeat itself, but I somehow doubt it.

I will say this, it is a beautiful film filled with inventive images.  Since original director Tim Burton is busy with another film, James Bobin (Muppets: Most Wanted) has stepped in, and given Wonderland a bright, vibrant and sharp look.  I doubt I will be able to recant much of the plot by the end of the summer, but I am likely to still remember some random images, such as young Alice (Mia Wasikowska, back again) dangling from the hands of a giant clock.  Most of the original cast has returned as well, and at the very least, nobody seems to be cashing a paycheck here.  The problem with the film lies solely with the screenplay by returning screenwriter Linda Woolverton.  She has essentially given us a thrill ride that is long on spectacle, but short on storytelling and common sense.  The plot literally sends Alice rocketing back and forth through time, seemingly at a whim.  And why is she doing this?  So that the Mad Hatter (once more played by Johnny Depp) and the Red Queen (Helena Bonham Carter, back for more) can resolve their family issues, and become better people.  So the movie is ultimately a bizarre cross between a summer event, and a therapy session.

As we rejoin Alice, she has fulfilled her promise of adventure that she made at the end of the last movie by becoming a sea captain, facing off against pirates as she makes her way back home to London in the film's rather bloated and pointless opening action sequence.  Once back on land, she is informed by her mother (Lindsay Duncan) that the arrogant fop Hamish (Leo Bill) will take away her ship (which once belonged to her late father) in order for the family to keep their family home.  Alice is distraught over the notion of there being no more adventures, but is then lured to a magical portal through a mirror that leads her back to Wonderland, which needs her help once again.  It turns out the Mad Hatter has fallen into a deep depression.  His family seemingly perished a long time ago, but he has found evidence that they might still be alive.  However, no one believes him, not even Alice.  This somehow causes the Hatter to fall into a sickly and near-death state.  The White Queen (Anne Hathaway) informs Alice that the only way to save the Hatter's life is to travel back in time, and find out the truth about his family and what happened.

To make this journey through time, Alice must sneak into a castle ruled over by Time itself, who in this movie is played by Sacha Baron Cohen as somewhat of an aristocratic buffoon who hangs around with tiny little steam powered comic relief robots.  Alice does manage to swipe an object called the Chronosphere, which allows her to rocket to any point in history she chooses.  She'll whisk about to different points in the Hatter's life, finding out about his relationship with his family, particularly his estranged father (Rhys Ifans), who never truly accepted his son.  Eventually, she will also try to look into the past of the Red Queen, and find out what led to her cruel ways, and her eventual falling out with her sister, the White Queen.  All this flying about to different time periods, and having Alice jumping back and forth between 19th Century England and Wonderland certainly sounds manic, and while the movie does have a certain level of silly energy, it's never as frantic or as imaginative as it needs to be.

That's because Alice Through the Looking Glass is never quite as grand as it should be.  For all of its talk about time travel, all we really get to see are the personal sad childhoods of two key characters.  If the film's look is full of visual invention, then the script and storytelling are sadly mundane.  At times, it seems like the fantastic images are really just there to distract us from the fact that there's nothing all that sensational actually going on.  This led to a strange disconnect for me with the movie.  I was interested and invested in the visuals and the performances, but I really just found it hard to care about what was going on.  It doesn't help that most of the supporting cast (and even some of the lead characters, such as the Hatter) are given little to do.  Characters like the Cheshire Cat and the Blue Caterpillar (voiced by the late Alan Rickman) are essentially given cameos, and only pop up because they were in the first film.  Otherwise, they really have nothing to do with anything, as do a lot of the returning characters.  Characters like the White Rabbit, as well as Tweedledum and Tweedledee, mainly are stuck in the background and made to look concerned at what's going on around them.

And yet, I can't really get too upset, mainly because I didn't think the first movie was all that great, and this never comes across as a betrayal of what came before.  Just like before, there are some enjoyable elements.  I particularly enjoyed Wasikowska's strong-headed portrayal of Alice.  She makes for an engaging heroine, even if her dialogue isn't exactly memorable.  The cast does breathe some limited life into the script at times, and everybody seems to be doing what they can to liven up what is essentially an unnecessary sequel.  At the very least, the movie doesn't play out like it knows it is unnecessary, which is more than I can say of some sequels I have seen recently.  I think those who enjoyed the original will find enough to like here.  The question is is there enough to like here in order to recommend?  This is a watchable, but very messy movie.  It never offends, but it also never seems as sure in itself as it should be.

I do think that Alice Through the Looking Glass could have worked beautifully with a different script, one which embraced the madness that its characters claim to cherish.  This ultimately ends up being a fairly mundane movie, with interesting characters, who would be even more interesting if the movie really let go and let them be what they should be.

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