Tim Burton's version of "Alice in Wonderland," with the ubiquitous and threatening Johnny Depp, looks smart and perhaps even the desired edgy. Our children will adore it, though it looks way too scary for anyone under 11, and the parents will enjoy the self-mocking wit of the Red Queen (another Burton cast regular, Bonham-Carter). What I have here is the trailer, and I already like the unintended juxtaposition between the Red Queen's plush imperial whimsy (somewhere between the Wicked Witch of the East and Sauron) and the buttery and trite Disney castle in the logo. The facts are that that Disney castle is a product of a sentimental, stupid-making longing for royalty that is gone with the 20th Century. Today we know what to make of kingship. We know to keep the frail throne of democracy ever evolving by using the trusted irony weapon on the current sitting monarch. Perhaps the Burton script borrows much from Oz, perhaps much from Snow White, perhaps too much from Burton, but the edginess is in the timing. What will the American imperial over-reach look to be when "Wonderland" hits the theaters in the Spring 2010? Will Alice best the Red Queen? Do we want the Red Queen to win? Who is the Red Queen? Hint? Initials? H.? And who is Alice? Hint?
My bet is on “H” for Hatter. Only madness is capable of unraveling the complex web of falsehoods and deceit we have woven for ourselves. Only madness can tear asunder the current political and ideological gauze that shrouds reason and smothers (common sense) solution; only madness can remove the putrid, festering blockages formed by petty corruption simply by paying no mind to the obviously insignificant and boldly stepping (hip-deep, if need be) forward. If not madness - then what?
Hillary is way too committed to shades of color. She’s a woman, after all. It makes her inflexible. It’ll cause her to break up in the crosscurrents. Madness (as in ‘Hatter’), on the other hand, is quick, witty and adaptable to any script, precisely because it understands the limitations of script. Madness needs no teleprompter. Put the Red Queen up against madness and she’ll be tempted to hang herself before long.
The only alternative is blunt-edged war – a ‘madness’ in its own right. It’s the season whose time has come when everything has grown beyond complicated; when nothing works anymore. I thought of this yesterday when our drains clogged and we had to call Roto-Rooter. Remember the jingle?
http://peterkoelliker.blogspot.com/
As an un-fan of modern entertainment I wonder if you meant to say "too scary for anyone OVER 11"?
I can also honestly say I wouldn't know Johnny Depp from the man on the moon without his ever present clown-face. Does he have some sort of incurable skin condition that requires that he be typecast thusly?
With Tiger Woods "apology" today I am fed up to the point of puking with the people we choose to idolize, including not only in Hollywood but in Washington DC and New York.
It's time we face it: ALL of our emperors stand before us naked and as we look around so many of our fellow citizens are still bowing low instead of picking up rocks to throw.
These are in another age the defectives we have chosen to lead us, making the discarded system of hereditary inheritance of power look not so ridiculous any more.
All the geniuses in Hollywood don't have the imagination to put before us schemes more convoluted than those cooked up by real life.
At least we can continue to write poetry about it. Thank you John and Peter.