[Loukas]

Verdict: Chunderland *

IT'S not often that you can start a film review quoting the wisdom of Orlando Bloom.

But Alice in Wonderland is a strange case. As Elf-features himself once said in his film Elizabethtown: "There's a difference between a failure and a fiasco. A failure is simply the non-presence of success. Any fool can accomplish failure.


"But a fiasco? A fiasco is a disaster of mythic proportions."


And readers, that's Alice in Wonderland for you - a bona fide, bums-in-the-air fiasco that needs to be burned and the ashes hurtled off in the direction of the nearest black hole as soon as you can, NASA. In fact it's Lesbian Vampire Killers bad - the kind of film that you don't just dislike or even hate, but one that your body physically rejects like a dodgy organ transplant.


I know it sounds extreme. After all, this is a much-touted, mega-budget, 3D spectacular from none other than Tim Burton and Disney, starring a host of family favourites. So let me explain. Set 15 or so years after the original Alice adventures, this film stars Mia Wasikowska as a 19-year-old Alice who remembers nothing of her first trip down the rabbit hole.


In the middle of an embarrassing marriage proposal, she flees to the woods, tumbles down the hole again and learns it is her destiny to kill the Jabberwocky, dethrone the Red Queen (Helena Bonham Carter) and return power to her White sister (Anne Hathaway).

In 2008, when Tim Burton chose Mia to play Alice, she had never acted in a big feature film before. And that remains true to this day. Cos bejaysus - there's not been a lead character this paper-flat since the South Park movie.


The girl's got all the warmth of a refrigerated trout, and a face you'd expect to see Blu-Tacked to the inside of a London phone box. She's not a heroine - she looks like she's ON heroin. She wanders through Wonderland - which has been renamed Underland for no good reason.

And along the way she meets the expected cast of characters played by famous names in full-on, blazing-egos, celeb-cameo mode. Paul Whitehouse does his See You Jimmy voice as the March Hare, and Alan Rickman texts in his five-or-so lines as the Caterpillar. Matt Lucas is Tweedledum and Tweedledee - two fake-looking CGI lumps with half a personality between them. And Stephen Fry plays the Cheshire Cat (the only beast in fiction smugger than him). All of them use funny-voice humour - where you get a wacky accent in place of actual gags.


But worst of all - and it pains me to say it - are Johnny Depp and Helena.

Johnny's Mad Hatter is a flailing, pointless idiot whose Scottish accent comes and goes like Ashley Cole on a US tour. It's the worst part he's played in his life. And whoever thought up his "breakdance" should be dragged out into the street and given the Saigon Execution treatment. Then there's Helena. She's Burton's missus so that's probably why he found it too hard to breathe those words that no husband wants to say to his wife:


"Stop doing a seventh-rate impression of Queenie from Blackadder II and put some bloody EFFORT into it, woman."


Now on to the special effects. Oddly, for a kids' film, there are THREE instances of someone getting spiked through the eyeball. By the third time, Burton's managed the peculiar trick of being disgusting AND boring at the same time. The 3D's cack, too. Remember Avatar and Up, with their long, graceful, tracking shots that drew you right into the picture? Well, there's none of that here.


Instead you get flat-looking people slightly in front of a flat-looking backdrop, and the occasional pointy thing shoved in your face - all cut together at a speed that'll snap your retinas. Because while Burton knows how to make a 2D movie look good, he plainly doesn't understand that the same techniques can sink a 3D one. Burton on his A-game is a force to be reckoned with. Think Sweeney Todd, Edward Scissorhands and Batman Returns.


But if there is a letter 26 places past Z, that's the type of game he's on here. So let me call it now: Alice in Wonder- land - the most disappointing film of 2010.


And just call me the Mad Hater.

NewsOfTheWorld.co.uk

I thought reviews would be excellent.. But this one completly shocked me..

Are you suprised??
Are you going to watch Alice In Wonderland or has this shocked you enough to stop you?
What do you think of this review?

[Tom4784]

I'm guessing Disney didn't pay them for a good review.... You can't trust most reviews especially from the likes of Tabloids. I'll wait to see what the proper publications have to say really.

It's a ridiculous review that screams 'look at me! I've insulted people lolz!'

[arista]

Yes I will Watch it on BluRay with 3-D Glasses.

[Tom4784]

News of the World gave Scary Movie 4 four stars.....I'm not really gonna take them seriously.

[Callum]

The NotW always give bad reviews to a film, once in a blue moon will they rate a film 5 stars.

[Jessica.]

Hmm I thought the reviews would be great tbh.
The soundtrack is great imo. I have had it a few days now.
I will watch the film on the internet, I'm not really a cinema person and none of our cinemas have 3D so there is no point.

[Arneldo]

I try to avoid reviews. At the end of the day - it's one person's opinion. My mate would completely avoid a movie if it got a bad review from Empire magazine. I think it's ridiculous.

[MrGaryy]

Tabloid reviews mean nothing. having said that, it will still get slaughtered.

[Stu]

Originally Posted by Dezzy

I'm guessing Disney didn't pay them for a good review.... You can't trust most reviews especially from the likes of Tabloids. I'll wait to see what the proper publications have to say really.

It's a ridiculous review that screams 'look at me! I've insulted people lolz!'

To be fair the movie screams ''LOOK! DIFFERENT! ~WHACXY! JOHNNY DEPP BEING CUTE AND NUTZ''.

[Enid]

Yeah, I'm not all that surprised. I have low expectations of the film now. Just seems like another big budget film, trying to cover over the cracks with pretty graphics and strange characters. A bit like Avatar.

[arsenalforever]

well thats the same guy who gave Transformer 2 5 stars

so i wouldn't take him serious at all

[BB_Eye]

News of the Screws film critics are invariably awful, but I saw clips of Alice on Jonathan Ross last week and it looked like total garbage to be honest. I think I'll avoid this movie now.

[IheartBB]

I don't take any notice of film critics. Film is subjective - for every thing a person hates, another one will like.

[BB_Eye]

Originally Posted by IheartBB

I don't take any notice of film critics.

Some critics have some valid and worthwhile things to say, but the ones that work for tabloids shouldn't be taken in the slightest bit seriously. Tabloid newspapers are actually the reason the UK has some of the worst film critics in the world. Most notably Jonathan and Paul Ross.