Come Away from the World

With stories like Alice in Wonderland and Peter Pan, what I like to see in movies is real engagement with their themes. Children's fantasy of that mid-nineteenth century to mid-twentieth century time was deeply psychological, so there is a lot to play with besides just bringing the characters and imagery to life (as has already been done plenty of times, often I might add without much engagement with the themes). Brenda Chapman's Come Away provides a unique interaction with the themes of children's fantasy stories.

While movies like Finding Neverland are essentially made for adults and films like A Little Princess are made for the family, Come Away lies somewhere in between. At its darkest, it has almost a spot of Pan's Labyrinth. But at its lightest, it is slightly reminiscent of Bridge to Terebithia. It is not a retelling of Peter Pan or Alice in Wonderland because those already exist. Instead, it is the story of a family in their darkest hour.

I will take a moment to praise the racial diversity of the cast (and to wonder why, especially given all of the 2020 conversations, films like this don't get more attention). Gugu Mbatha-Raw and David Oyelowo are pretty familiar faces to me at this point as they're both had some pretty great roles in the past few years. Besides the Littleton siblings, we also had diversity in the troupe of children they meet in London. Even though they're the equivalent of the Lost Boys, the oldest boy in particular reminded me of the Artful Dodger--especially after my comments after David Copperfield about how there could easily be a non-white Dodger casting. Anyways, Fagin's boys are a lot like the Lost Boys, aren't they? 

We also have a Victorian interracial marriage. There is something very subtle and deliberate about the opening scenes. We see the children first, then Angelina Jolie as their mother, and then we see David Oyelowo as their father and confirmation of the interracial marriage. We see both she and he dressed in upper class clothes, so when we first see him in his workshop we're not sure if it's just a hobby or his living (aka. a trade and not an upper class role). Then we realize that yes, he is a tradesman, and we see his wife working in the kitchen with only one servant to help. So Rose's sister's comments about him have this subtlety to them: she is talking of class and never brings up race, but it's a visual that we do see on screen. So it's like the beginning scenes portray this magic, beautiful family--and then the rest of the film introduces all the messiness of life.

Notice this, too, in how the fantasy/play sequences are portrayed. Initially, we see the three siblings playing at being Peter Pan and Tiger Lily and they have these broad smiles of joy on their faces. Later, though, we see other scenes. The Lost Boys tumbling out of a tree to entice Peter to come away. Alice shrinking down below her bedside table after drinking her mother's "potion." The fantasy has becoming heartbreaking instead of heartwarming. It is no longer happy imaginations running wild; it is hurting hearts trying to escape their pain. 

And this is how we come to the curious thing about how this film is put together. Peter Pan, you see, never grows up (it's Wendy that does that)--and the story portrays this with awareness of the tragedy that he will never grow up. But Alice in Wonderland is a coming of age story; Alice walks into Wonderland a child and walks out ready to begin her growing up and the formation of her identity as an individual. This duality is exactly what happens to the Littleton children: one grows up and one does not. One is Peter Pan and one is Alice. One falls away to fantasy; the other uses it to help her make her way in the real world. That is engagement with theme. 

It's quite a heartbreaking movie, and there is some great material about the parents and Rose's sister and Jack's father and brother, as well. But I only have so much space in one post. While perhaps the ending of the movie felt a little unresolved in comparison to the careful subtlety of the earlier sequences, overall this was a good film. It has appeal both to be a family favorite and to satisfy the eager analysis of viewers like me. 

Eden Recovered: Rey's Journey

If there is anyone who still needs a spoiler-warning, yes, this post contains spoilers on The Rise of Skywalker.

"Serpent! Serpent! Serpent!" C-3PO cries out, and a percentage of the audience shouts out, Alice in Wonderland! Star Wars being archetypal and all about symbols and themes, it would follow that they would directly include literary references (especially given that one of the writers, Chris Terrio, was a lit. major). But why include this particular reference?

The snake scene is full of symbolic value. It is one of the many examples of healing from past harm. D-O runs from Rey's touch and then, once he is able to trust again, helps the Resistance. The snake first appears threatening, as if ready to kill the company, and then ends up helping them find a way out after Rey shows it kindness in healing its wound. Kylo experiences kindness and acceptance and forgiveness from Rey where before he only felt hurt and unworthiness--and so he chooses to lay aside the past. In the simplest form, the snake is Kylo. Rey literally heals both of their physical wounds and then receives assistance from them both.

The snake is also a traditional symbol of evil and temptation and disobedience and rebellion, going back to the garden of Eden. And the redemption story that you see in the film in D-O, the snake, and in Kylo Ren/Ben Solo is essentially a recovery of the Fall from Eden. The snake was a symbol of evil and that's why 3PO and Finn and Poe were afraid of it, ready to just kill it to protect themselves. But Rey didn't want to stop at saving her life; her aims were higher. She was on a mission. So instead of killing instead of being killed, she won the snake over to her side and consequently was speeded on her way. She took what had been given the name of evil and gave it a new name.

Just as she gives herself a new name. And that's where the Alice in Wonderland reference comes in. That story is all about "nonsense" situations that in some way express the concept of growing up. The serpent quote comes from when Alice is growing so much that her neck becomes very long and reaches into the sky so that she can't even see her hands. So she starts craning her neck into the trees to look for the rest of her body, and a bird shouts serpent at her and explains that she has been trying to keep her eggs safe from serpents. Alice tries to explain that she's a girl not a serpent and that even though she does eat eggs, she doesn't eat eggs like that; but trying to explain her actual identity is difficult in the circumstances and the bird really doesn't believe her.

It really isn't nonsense if you look at it on a symbolic level. The core of it is establishing personal identity--even in the face about assumptions from other people about that identity, assumptions that can even start to get you questioning who you are. Alice tries to say that she doesn't want the bird's eggs because she's a girl not a serpent--but she also has to admit that girls eat eggs, too, even if it isn't like that. Rey is trying to affirm that she is not a dark Jedi or the heir to the Sith--even when she does things (like using the force to heal physical wounds, perhaps?) that are traditionally associated with the dark side. She even doubts herself, fearing the vision she has of herself on the Sith throne with Kylo.

But Rey is more aware of what is going on than Alice is. Rey is a woman choosing her path in life, not a girl coming of age. She realizes that no one can make her be something that she doesn't choose. She is heir to Palpatine but she does not have to accept the inheritance of darkness. Instead, she chooses to be adopted into the Skywalker lineage, into the legacy of hope and light. Rey, in choosing her identity, initiates healing and redemption from the Fall.

Departing Wonderland

As I suspected, the spin-off of Once Upon a Time, by name Once Upon a Time in Wonderland, has finished off after only one thirteen episode season. There will be no more episodes, and I don't think there need to be any more episodes. While Wonderland went off to a good start, it always had a much shorter scope than Once, and I did find its power over me waning as the season went on. Once has good and mediocre episodes, but it's those good episodes or scenes that keep me going.

I just started to get a little bored by Wonderland. Part of the beauty of Once is the game: trying to make connections, guess what's happening next, figure out character motives, and such. Because Wonderland had many fewer characters and many fewer plot points, there was less to ponder. And while I love to analyze the way in which Once interacts with fairy tale themes, Wonderland hardly ever seemed to interact in this way. In the final episode, the White Rabbit says that Wonderland is about finding yourself--which is completely true, if you've studied the book at all. Wonderland is all about the internal coming to have an external and physical representation. But just because the show threw in that idea at the end doesn't mean they fully explored it. (Sorry, I'm still quite partial to Nick Willing's Alice and can never seem to find anyone's interpretation of Wonderland quite as compelling.)

Once Upon a Time in Wonderland was essentially just a love story. Alice and Cyrus, and Will and Anastasia, stand in as the happy lovers who get to be together in the end. Jafar and Amara are the pair who just used each other. And then there are also other types of love. There is paternal love. While Alice is able to repair her relationship with her father, Jafar isn't, and so there is some interesting contrast there. There is friendship, most notably between Alice and Will. There is a brief bit in there with Cyrus and his brothers--although I think they introduced them rather too randomly and suddenly.

And love stories are good and all--that's one of the reasons why Once has been so successful. But why use Wonderland, with a hint of Agrabah, as the setting for this story? There has to be a specific reason why this story takes place in this world, and I'm not sure the show gave us one. Did we really see Alice learning about herself and becoming more herself as a result of her time in Wonderland? We only very briefly saw Alice without hope in the pilot. Otherwise, she has been optimistic, strong, quick-thinking, and kind. We're essentially told she has a character arc, but we don't actually see that development. And that's the only thing that pulls us specifically to Wonderland.

I ramble. I don't mean to say that the show was terrible. It was a nice thirteen episodes to watch for some Thursday night entertainment. Jafar and the Jabberwocky were great. Anastasia was also pretty good. Cora made a great couple of re-entrances. But this show just didn't have that spark of special something that the main show has; I didn't feel as invested in it all. Wonderland has been a nice little diversion, but now I'm looking forward to focusing on Once again (the second half of Once's season has been generally great so far, by the way).

Frankenstein in Wonderland

Anybody else watching Once Upon a Time in Wonderland? As the show returns for the second half of its season, I'm starting to get disappointed. It had a good start, but now I feel like it's outlasting its potential--and like it doesn't have much of anything to do with the themes and such of Alice in Wonderland, anyway.

But isn't that how it usually is with Alice in Wonderland-inspired pieces? There are plenty of movies based directly on the book, then there are others that take greater liberties with the story. And then there are the movies that take away only a very vague inspiration. Something like Phoebe in Wonderland, for instance. And there are even more that take only something from the title. Hold onto that thought.

Back when I was in English 200, my professor explained the widespread influence of Frankenstein. I forget the wording she used, but she basically said that it's the most referenced book or the book that exists most in society's collective consciousness. Everybody's heard of Frankenstein, even if they don't know that he's the doctor and not the monster--though it seems to be usual these days for Frankenstein references to explain that difference. Whether it's a passing line, a costume, or some sort of adaptation, Frankenstein has had an influence. The wonderful questions about humanity, medicine, and the creation of life that exist within the book may not always be remembered, but the book still is in some form.

And isn't that how it's becoming with Alice in Wonderland? I think it's safe to say that the average person hasn't read Frankenstein (for the average college student, the percentage is probably different). I think perhaps a few more people have read at least parts of Alice in Wonderland, or adapted bits, or something. Maybe. I know I didn't read either book until college. But I think people are still more likely to be familiar with Alice from the old Disney animated version, or maybe another movie they grew up with, than because of the book itself. And yet there is something compelling in both Alice in Wonderland and Frankenstein that leads us to continue thinking about them and referencing them.

They're both books creating their own mythology. Frankenstein, as representative of an out of control monster. Alice in Wonderland, as representative of a world where everything has been turned on its head. The details may sometimes be forgotten, but the basic sense of each story continues on and on in form after form. And that's how stories live forever.

The "Alice" Character

Wasn't last night's episode of Once Upon a Time fantastic? It was like we had been waiting two and a half seasons to see all that unfold--and I guessed correctly about the identity of a certain Peter Pan, I might add. But I'd like to take this opportunity to go over another fantasy-related concept I've been pondering: the "Alice" figure.

The story of Alice in Wonderland has always made for a bit of a conundrum for anyone adapting it to film: there is very little of a real (traditional, I mean) plot line and the main character does not change or progress or anything like that from beginning to end (symbolically, she does--but not within the physical framework of the story). So Alice often looks very flat on film, because she is in fact, purposefully, written fairly flat. Some filmmakers know how to work with this; others just bypass it and turn Alice into an active character. Tim Burton kept Alice fairly restrained while still trying to show outward signs of her growth, as though the Jabberwocky and the proposal. In Alice, Nick Willing made Alice into a dynamic character while keeping her as the straight man to the more comedic or dramatic characters.

It's a very similar route that Once Upon a Time in Wonderland takes. Alice usually speaks in the same restrained manner as we're used to, keeping her facial features in line--but she knows how to sword-fight, she's courageous, and she initiates action instead of just reacting to it. The concept of her is sometimes perhaps a little too evocative of Nick Willing's approach, but we'll just hope that's because the two character interpretations come from the same era in time, right? (Even their outfits are slightly similar . . . but I digress.)

While I still don't much like the book Alice in Wonderland, it's interesting how interpretations of it work. The book is hugely symbolic: you can interpret it based on psychology and social behavior and whatever else. In adaptations, people often make the symbolic level active and alive. Instead of leaving symbolic interpretations possible for the audience, they design their story according to one interpretation. Nick Willing focused on Alice's loss of her father and her need to grow past that childhood event. The TV show also explains that Alice has a troubled relationship with her father, but she doesn't seem overly troubled by it in the present day; her focus is more on getting Cyrus back. So that makes her much more of a traditional character, driven by a simple desire and goal.

It's strange to me that this spin-off show almost entirely takes out the flat "Alice" character when Once Upon a Time itself created its own Alice through Emma. By now, Emma has experienced character development and we've learned about who she is and who she wants to be and all that. But she began much like Alice in Wonderland: she was the fairly flat, emotionally stoic character thrown into the midst of other colorful characters and situations she didn't fully understand. For me, Emma can be one of the weak points of the show because of the way her character is designed. When the Alice character is already so difficult to give to a modern audience, I sometimes wonder why this show (and other stories) decide to create an Alice character. Maybe a story just needs a straight man to contrast with more layered characters?

Alice (2009)

I may or may not have rented Alice simply because Andrew-Lee Potts (from Primeval) is in it. Otherwise, another version of Alice in Wonderland? I'd be as interested in that as another variation of Pride and Prejudice (which is very little indeed).

But Alice (2009) did have another positive going for it: Nick Willing, also the man behind Tin Man (2007), directed it. Both of these are TV miniseries, with the first based somewhat on Alice and Wonderland and the second on The Wizard of Oz. That loosely-based-on, almost-sequel state is awkward and easily done badly. But Tin Man was rather interesting when I watched it a year or two ago, and so was Alice.

Though it was aired, I believe, as two episodes, it is just a solid three hours on the DVD; that's quite a bit of run time, so my attention span did start to run once or twice, but just barely. This was a fun piece that delved a little into psychology and symbols, taking just enough from the original books to set up a basis for Wonderland but also allowing enough to be different to tell a separate story. Alice was the proper "straight man" (as opposed to the more comedic characters), developing more internally than outwardly in a way that is reminiscent of the book (although, of course, with the internal/external thing, Wonderland after all is a part of her internal self made external). And I love what Andrew-Lee Potts did with the Hatter. That character becomes the sort of link between this internal/made-up world Alice visits and the "real world." By providing a contrast to Jack, he becomes the external evidence of the change Alice goes through. And who doesn't love a happy ending? Again, bear in mind that it's still a TV series, but one that carries through by means of actors' performances. At its heart, it's rather a thoughtful piece.

One Movie, Two, Three, Four

I have now seen three movies in the past week and a half. That's a lot for me, but movies do seem to come in droves. There doesn't seem to be anything in April of May that I want to see, then there will be two in June. I guess that's just the normal way of it.

The first of the three, Remember Me, I already talked about. Then last Friday I saw Alice in Wonderland (3D, of course). I agree with the general consensus that the visuals are good and the story is, well, just the story. It was just that with such a stunning visual scene and being such a big production (with a big budget, too), the storyness of it, at times, wasn't what I found myself expecting. Maybe Remember Me was just too fresh in my mind . . . . Anyway, not bad, and Johnny Depp as the Hatter was one of the highlights. The last movie was The Runaways, which I saw yesterday before class. Not a bad way to start the morning; lots of music to wake you up. And let me say to the critics, please, why do you have to compare "Robert Pattinson's Remember Me" with "Kristen Stewart's The Runaways?" They aren't at all similar. Both were smaller productions, but the indie feel is much more for the latter than the former. One is about two families, one about a '70's rock band. There is much more to define them by than two actors, though, yes, I likely wouldn't have seen either of them if not for these two said actors. I liked Remember Me more, just because it's more my kind of movie. But The Runaways, that did brighten my day a little, I think. I wasn't very familiar with the music before, but it kept playing in my head until I had to make a Pandora station to listen to while doing some work. Now that I hadn't expected.

And the New Moon DVD came out this weekend. Here is the Borders version, in all its glory. At least, as much as my horrible photography skills and bad lighting can express.

One reason I like this version better is the packaging. I'm not keen on the other DVD covers, but all of this one is quite nice.
In the middle section is a pocket, which includes this necklace with the Quileute tribe logo:
Or if you're Team Cullen like me, it has a reverse side with the Cullen crest:

The extra Borders features weren't as much as I had been hoping for, but were still better than just the normal ones. I do think that with the huge Twilight fan following, there could be more special features. People want to know everything about how these movies were, and I like special features, but it usually seems that the movies I like don't have very many.

The new Liz Curtis Higgs book, Here Burns My Candle, came out last week. I very much want to read it, but I'll have to wait until summer. And something induced me to also get Twilight: The Graphic Novel. I don't read graphic novels; I've never even held one. I don't know why I got this one . . . it says something about loyalty, I guess. But it may be interesting.

(And I don't know why this last part is underlined -- I can't make it go away, so forgive it).