Alice in Terrorland

It was soulless garbage, and a shallow attempt to make the classic Alice in Wonderland into a horror, which other media will tell you this actually can be done well. This wasn't one of those examples.

The dialogue is awkward, and weird. The idea that Alice is being read the original, and in her fever dream is being taken to wonderland could have worked actually. But damn, girl your fever dreams are boring. Even the idea that her parents have passed and that has altered her mental state, has existed before. This just does that badly.

The costume elements are boring. The pacing is weird and doesn't work. And it has moments where it tries to be edgy but, it falls flat because it's trying too hard.

While it was great seeing Rula Lenska* in a choice role pulling out all the stops, the production is a dreary misfire, full of imagery that bores rather than intrigues. A half hour's with of story is dragged out to a length that felt far longer than the running time. If you care to watch, fast forward to all of Lenska's scenes. The rest is, sadly, not to be recommended.

*I was a member of the Rula Lenska Fan Club here in the United States, a kind of parody of fan clubs since Lenska was only known for her Alberto VO5 TV ads in which she introduced herself, "I'm Rula Lenska," to a befuddled but bemused American public that had never heard of her before-her lack of notoriety became, itself, a sensation and a punch line for late night comedians like Carson. What the RLFC did successfully, with tongue in cheek, was humanize the actress with bits of news and background. Lenska already had a career overseas, so we heard about that too. I drifted away as I grew older and the novelty wore off. Lenska didn't catch on in a big way in the States, and years went by. First with video and flash forward to now with streaming, vintage overseas entertainment has thankfully become ever more readily available.

This is apparently some film school dropout's final project. They TRY to be "artsy" throughout the whole thing. It starts out with three rapid fire scenes with no context. Then we are "treated" to a monochromatic kaleidoscope of fractal images with some trippy music in the background. I swear, if I'd had some LSD, I'd have at least been in the right mood.

All these dropouts seem to think that slow motion builds tension. It is an overused trope that every one of these art projects over use. I'm serious... I have seen molasses flowing up hill in January at a faster pace than this... movie. There is one scene where Alice is literally slow motion crawling across the floor for a GOOD five minutes. If they had run all of the slow motion scenes at normal speed, the movie would have been at least half an hour shorter. Not a lie.

Then, as is the case with every single modern "movie," the entire thing is filmed with two candles and a 4 watt night light bulb. I swear... what is it with this freaking trend?! You might as well make it a radio play for all you can actually see.

I'll bet you want to know about the plot, though, don't you? Yeah... you and me both. The entire thing is a really bad retelling of "Alice in Wonderland" with a twist you can see coming a mile away.

There is an adult, x-rated version of "Alice in Wonderland" - a musical at that! - from 1976 that has a better story line, better acting (and better lighting) than this trainwreck of a "movie."

"Alice in Terrorland" is another adaptation of a children's novel to the horror genre, and the result is terrible. Speaking of the art direction and cinematography, the result is pleasant, but the director's work is bad, it seems non-existent, the actors try to give good performances but the terrible script fails to favor them. The costume design is simple, the soundtrack goes completely unnoticed and the horror and suspense elements are non-existent. The film totally fails in quality, in addition to being a sleeping pill throughout its duration. "Alice in Terrorland" will be remembered, but as one of the worst horror films in history.

Me and my friend watched Alice in Terrorland primarily for the reason that Jon Paul Gates, who is an icon, is in it. That was our first mistake, the film is extremely dull and forgettable. With few scares and even fewer Jon Paul Gates (so sad!) What it does have going for it is its pretty good cinematography and interesting colour scheme.

The plot is confusing and unexciting, but at least they tried more than the average low budget horror flick of "this is a spooky house, here are some ghosts, be scared!" I liked the costumes in part too. But these few positives can't excuse such a dull, forgettable and lackluster film.

3/10: Such a dull film can't even justify its short run time.