Burton's IMAX Alice In Wonderland

Debbie and I went...on a glorious Spring day. Kind of odd being inside waiting over an hour in a queue when we could walk outside in the sun without jackets. But no matter how old and shriveled I get, I still like eye candy and sized up everyone in the queue from 1-10 in seductibility. A lucky afternoon, in my mind there were a lot of shoes parked under my bed.
   If you've seen Avatar, however, save your money. After all the time I spent researching this movie, this topic, Lewis Carroll and his photographer buddy Dodgeson, both Debbie and I had all we could do to keep awake. After a few special effects where we both grabbed in the air at vines and cables and butterflies out over the audience, we kept dozing off...sitting kind of side saddle so the other didn't notice we were sleeping in class kind of thing. Since I treated, she didn't want me to be hurt because it wasn't holding her interest, and I felt the same way because I was the one who pushed to see the movie.
  There were hundreds of us paying $14 a ticket  having stood in line for over an hour, and one family of little kids screeching and crying all the way through it. Something unfair about that. That mother didn't have the sense to check out movie content before she took them?
  Anyway, the colors in the movie were considerably subdued, even dark, and sometimes too "brown tinted, like old tintype photos, that style used to give the illusion of age. The bright colors were rare and thus the muddled colors somewhat detracted from the 3D effect. One quickly adjusted to the medium and it was far from the rousing pit of the stomach in my throat sensation of Avatar. For such a monumental project and such a huge effort put in by everyone, I was disappointed in the results for me, for the artists, for the production crew that worked so hard on it.  It was as if Burton had his writer create a story, and he went to Lewis Carroll and borrowed the characters to use them in.
  In spite of a stellar cast, the characters were , well, flat. The Red Queen reminded me too much of Bette Davis and even her "Off with her head" was so clipped Davis style, it was not effective. It needed to be more roundhouse bawdy. Johnny Depp was frankly boring and his giggle reminded me of a better movie where Mozart had the identical giggle seducing young ladies under the banquet table.
('member that?). The White Queen however totally amused me with her affected mannerisms  and hand gestures moving about- the only live character to pull off something original and hilariously funny.The only inane behavior really came from the March hare. totally cartoon, but the only character delightfully outrageous and full of zest and bi polar energy hurling teacups  and pastries about.( yes, we ducked)  Perhaps we are too used to Depp playing bizarre roles to be surprised by his antics anymore-as outrageous as he tried to be, he simply wasn't in this context.
  I guess my validation of my taste if not my manhood, came with the rush to the men's room and the long line of men standing against the wall waiting for the few toilets available for such a huge theater. The tiled walls echoed our voices as we uncharacteristically at movie men's rooms gushed with opinions  to anyone in the room. In this case we somehow felt we had locker room rights because it was a family movie that failed us when we could have been watching NBA or NHL or( right) cleaning the garage.  They really grumbled their disappointment,  like pre-pubescent boys having wished probably more than their kids and family for a good fantasy. "Well,we can't compare it to Avatar...Avatar is in a class by itself". "Well what the hell was that for the whole family at 14 bucks a pop?" " I dunno, I fell asleep. Couldn't keep awake. It just went on and on and on." "I clapped at the end...not because it was good, but just because it was finally the end." "At least we are walking out into daylight and not dark and slushy snow with a suck drive home."
  To boot, Burton couldn't resist the Oz tradition of returning to the engagement party to watch Alice politely assert her new self to all the guests so we could re-connect the real folks to the dream world folks. ( most of us are pretty dumb that way and need it pointed out) Boring!  I guess it would have been really monumental if we could return to Richard III ( off with his head reference), Disraeli...#1 ass kisser to the Queen, and the War of the Roses,  or the mathematical principles incorporated, etc. or even the Alice Liddell scandal, but even I know that's too much to ask.
   We could only find Burger King to dine at, cause Debbie eats fish- and I didn't plan lunch well for some place better. We just took what we could find along famous Rt 1.  God bless my doctor, but there's nothing for me like a double bacon cheeseburger and fries. Once a year Doc? Gimme a break! I skipped the vanilla shake this time...c'mon.
 We didn't get popcorn after all, but the cute couple next to us did. The guy was especially cute, so I grabbed their popcorn and held it in my lap. What an appetite that guy had!
Love you folks...save your money for Hubble, coming up. Now that looks spectacular!