Into the Woods

Once the familiar becomes strange, as Michael Sandel has said, things are never quite the same. So it is in Disney's adaptation of Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine's "Into the Woods." Here, the familiar becomes quite strange. I recall complaining to my theatre professor when my university put on a production of "Into the Woods" my freshman year that I didn't care for the sudden change in mood during the second act of the musical. But he and others convinced me of this necessity; strange is often quite good, and Disney, of all studios, has done a mostly good job of avoiding the "Disneyfication" of these famous stories like it did for practically a century.

"Into the Woods" is a musical featuring a variety of different fairy tales so juxtaposed with each other that one might be advised to take a copious amount of notes. There's the usual suspects: a little hungry girl with a red cape; Cinderella, slaving away at home for her terrible step-family; Jack, unable to help his mother because their cow will not produce any milk. But then there's something about a curse being placed on a house of a baker and his wife, or something like that. The plot is not too interesting. But the couple are forced to collect a series of items for a witch (Meryl Streep), who placed the curse, and so on their journey they come across all these characters.

Many of the musical numbers fall fairly flat in terms of interest, but there is something certainly peculiar about it all. Here, as our characters sing, the woods are just trees, and the trees are just woods; stay on the path, they may try, but something wicked surely will come. Little by little, we see these characters' stories becoming intertwined. Little Red Riding Hood (Lilla Crawford) embarks on her journey into the woods to bring some bread to Granny (who is sick in bed), and, as we all expect, she comes across a hungry wolf (Johnny Depp). Depp appears only in one sequence as the Wolf, ears pointed and tie undone, with long black claws. It's a pretty good scene, and despite the (mostly) unfair wave of recent criticism he has recently received, like when the Washington Post's Stephanie Merry called him a "51-year-old ham," it shows that Depp still has it. Is the sequence disturbing? Yes, but by now everyone knows the dark history of these old fairy tales and their didactic nature -- take a read to find out what really happens to Cinderella's stepsisters in the original Grimm stories.

The other actors are also quite good. I knew Meryl Streep and Anna Kendrick (Cinderella) could sing, but I had no idea Tracy Ullman (Jack's mother) and James Corden, who plays the baker, could as well. But the one who really is impressive is Captain Kirk himself -- Chris Pine, as Prince Charming, belts out "Agony" with co-star Billy Magnussen in one of the best scenes in the movie. Also giving good performances are Crawford and Daniel Huttlestone as Jack (of the "Beanstalk" story). (Huttlestone appeared in "Les Miserables" two years ago and Crawford makes her film debut here; she also played the title character in "Annie" in the Broadway revival.)

Job certainly well done to director Rob Marshall. We all knew he could get great singing from his actors from his previous movies, but beyond that he deserves credit for this incredible production design, especially its design by Dennis Gassner and Anna Pinnock, and visual effects team lead by Christian Irles, Matt Johnson, and Stefano Pepin. In addition to a nomination for Streep and the production design team, Colleen Atwood is deservedly nominated for her costumer design. This is truly one of the most visually impressive movies of the year, especially the sequences featuring the angry lady-giant, imaginably one of the more difficult moments to visualize. Beyond that, there might be some disappointment. There isn't quite as much thought as I think many people would want, and I don't think there's any way of being able to decipher if this is or isn't a parable about AIDS, as some have theorized the original musical is. Still, compared to many of the disappointing duds of December, "Into the Woods" is quite the treat.

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Alice in Wonderland

Todd Gilchrist recently wrote an interesting piece about the filmmakers who have influenced Tim Burton. It is not difficult to see the obvious similarities between Burton's work and that of Robert Wiene, Fritz Lang, Roger Corman, Ray Harryhausen, Terrence Fischer and Walt Disney, all mentioned in Gilchrist's article. The homages Burton paid to each of those filmmakers were really simple; obvious to film lover's but not blatant plagiarism. In essence they were appropriate and fitting, and helped to establish a Burton look highly admired.

In his newest film, "Alice in Wonderland," however, there is little of that previously found influence, despite how ripe his material was for it. It is not too inconceivable perhaps to envision what the film would have looked like with Burton's previous ways of making films. There could have been an Expressionism-style set, just as he did with "Batman Returns," or Corman silliness, just as there was in "Beetlejuice." (Wouldn't it have been more enjoyable to see Alan Rickman in a costume, able to project so much of that famous persona of many of his characters with that face, instead of being hidden behind graphics that appeared to have been stolen from a children's show?) There might have been a stop-motion climax of the Jabberwocky instead of hackneyed use of CGI.

Tim Burton has been in good company, with filmmakers like George Lucas, Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson salivating over CGI effects. Who can truly blame Burton? With the encouragement and perhaps pressure he must have felt when James Cameron's "Avatar" made so much money all over the world, it was probably much easier to shelve the older ways in favor of a CGI orgy.

In this adaptation, Alice (Mia Wasikowska) is pressured to marry a young man she is not interested in the slightest, so she rushes away from. Predictably, she falls down a hole and returns to Wonderland, a place she has completely forgotten. Her old friends (whom she has forgotten) are happy to see her, for the Red Queen has taken things over, and they need a champion to set things right.

On an acting note, Burton has as usual assembled a fine cast who all appropriately fit the parts: Stephen Fry as the Cheshire Cat, Alan Rickman as the Caterpillar, Christopher Lee as the Jabberwocky, Michael Gough as the Do-Do Bird, Anne Hathaway as the White Queen, Michael Sheen as the White Rabbit, Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter, and Helena Bonham Carter as the Red Queen. Depp is his usual fun to watch. Particularly noteworthy is his approach to the character, and he explained that his inspiration to have the Mad Hatter's hair be orange came from the fact that the term "mad as a hatter" came from mercury poisoning from the hats of the 19th century, though for some reason he's so mad that his accent arbitrarily changes so often that it's maddening, if you will. Bonham Carter, though, really does shine here as the villain. Her head so ingeniously enlarged, and she really has understood how to perfectly combine the silliness and the terror of the character's tantrums. Finally, Lee, who has found his renaissance in the cinema thanks to Burton, has said that he is simply too old to travel to New Zealand if he is asked to return as Saruman in "The Hobbit," though he would like to voice the role of Smaug the dragon. If he does not get his wish, then he would have at least achieved it here as the Jabberwocky, though his voice is heard only briefly.

The sense of imagination I found in the Disney "Alice" and in previous Burton films was mostly missing here. For one, Burton has stated that he never particularly enjoyed the previous adaptations and so this called for a new story. So, in a style similar to "Hook," Alice has forgotten all about Wonderland and must learn about its wonders in new ways. That is fine, theoretically, but as a friend of mine stated, "Alice couldn't remember anything about Wonderland, and dammit, neither could I!"

Another complaint is that Burton has shifted away from his wonderful sets and marvelously simplistic stop-motion effects in favor of these bad CGI effects. By the end of the film, Alice now has a sword (so does the Mad Hatter), and she and the rest of the actors have to do their best to make believe with green screens. And finally, 3-D glasses are not the most comfortable glasses to wear, but sometimes (like in "Coraline") the movie is so good and the 3-D is done so well that it is justifiable. Here, this is not the case. One of the things that really made Burton's previous films work is that the designs of the films really elevated the stories, instead of simply forming a distraction. With "Alice in Wonderland," the latter prevails.

There is a fascinating article in the New York Times by Melanie Bayley called "Algebra in Wonderland." Bayley writes about the mathematical symbolism in Carroll's "Alice" stories. One example is the Queen of Hearts (or Red Queen in this movie) is often keen on ordering an execution by way of ax (a pun, according to Bayley, on the word "axes," the plural of axis of a graph). The point I'd like to make is that Carroll's stories apparently are ripe with symbolism, philosophy, and thought, little of which is evident here.

This does not make the movie awful, and to use the simplistic language of the newer "At the Movies," would say "rent it." But if one is looking for that true sense of wonder and awe found in Burton's previous films, one might be disappointed. To put it another way, hopefully this concludes Burton's trilogy--"Planet of the Apes," "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory," and "Alice in Wonderland"--of films that are not particularly bad but not particularly satisfying either. Though, to be fair, in the time that he made those films, he also made "Big Fish" and "The Corpse Bride," much finer films. I do hope his next tale will be more wonderful. Please, Mr. Burton, please help rid movie-making of this unhealthy addiction. A return to the "Burton look" would help.

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The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus

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To discuss Terry Gilliam’s “The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus,” one must contemplate whether more attention should be paid to Gilliam’s storytelling or the fact that this is the final performance of the late Heath Ledger. Because both elements are top-notch, a sense of guilt or inequality should not exist, and therefore both factors can be given nearly equal attention. This is a fascinatingly imaginative film, and Gilliam’s production and Ledger’s performance are what help make this film wonderful.

Christopher Plummer, an actor who has continually been granted better and better roles as he ages, plays the title character, a former monk-turned-magic man who made a deal with the Devil. The Devil (terrifically played by Tom Waits), of course tricks him, and Doctor Parnassus, who wins immortality, must surrender his child (Lily Cole) to the Devil on her sixteenth birthday. Facing financial uncertainty with his traveling imaginarium along with his daughter and two other characters (Verne Troyer and Andrew Garfield—Garfield’s character is in love with Cole’s), Parnassus is running out of time. The team stumbles upon a man who from the lightening appears to be dancing on water, until it is revealed that he is in fact hanging. They rescue this man (Ledger), and he tells them that he cannot recall his name or past, though the audience discovers that this is not entirely the case. Still, Tony, as it is revealed he is called, is inspired to help Parnassus and company revive the show for a contemporary audience. Inside this imaginarium, a bizarre world of the traveler’s imagination exists, where he or she must choose between Parnassus or the Devil. But another bet is made between the two: first to five souls wins, and if Parnassus is the victor, then he shall forever be at peace with his daughter. This probably gets lost in confusion and details, for many things are hastily explained, including a twist near the climax of the film that is hurriedly revealed by a character.

It was very much a bittersweet experience to view “The Dark Knight” last year, as Heath Ledger, the Marlon Brando and James Dean of our time, is no longer with us. It was comforting, though, to know that there would be one final performance, which is excellent and worth the wait, and one final film, thanks to Gilliam’s imagination and the assistance of three great actors. Ledger apparently improvised about half of his dialogue, and despite the details of his insomnia during the filming and despite the fact that there are still rumors around that portraying the Joker terrorized him to his death, Ledger is remarkably vigorous in this film. Many moments are Gilliam at his finest, like the arbitrary Russian dance of violence and brute (alas, the Russians are out-seduced by a large Russian woman). This is also a bit of a dark film, though not as dark as “Time Bandits,” but it ends humbly and sweetly with the end titles “A film from Heath Ledger and friends,” and the film is dedicated to Ledger and William Vince, one of the producers who also died during the production from cancer.

There are two very terrific interviews with Gilliam that help put the experience of this film in perspective. One is with Michael Mechanic of Mother Jones, who draws a connection between Parnassus and his inability to have his stories be appreciated by others (the studio executives) and Gilliam. Gilliam, in his usual boyish humor, simply shrugs of the situation, but Mechanic is right. Gilliam will forever be known not only for his wonderful visuals and remarkable stories but for his tumultuous relationships with the Hollywood system (though he noted in the interview with Mother Jones that his Hollywood films were the ones which went off without a hitch). The second interview is with Charles McGrath of the New York Times, in which Gilliam tells of his struggles. His pains, called “Job-like” by McGrath, were well-documented in his ill-fated attempt to bring “Don Quixote” to the screen with Johnny Depp; the disaster was turned into an award-winning documentary “Lost in La Mancha.” But these Quixote problems for this quixotic director were minimal compared to the story of “Parnassus,” when in January of 2008 the world learned that one of the most talented actors had died of an accidental drug overdose from sleeping pills. “They just keep kicking me as I lay there on the ground,” he said in the interview. “But to me this really felt final. I thought, ‘The movie gods really don’t want me to continue.’ They were saying, ‘Stop, before you kill again.’” Convinced that he must end the production, he was provided faith from his daughter Amy Gilliam, a producer of the film, and his friend Depp to continue. The idea to change the script to allow for three actors—Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrell to play different incarnations of Tony in the fantastical imaginarium—was Depp’s, who could only film his scenes when he had a break from Michael Mann’s “Public Enemies,” and the three stars contributed their salary to the daughter of Health Ledger.

I was most struck by Tony’s first transformation, in which Tony is played by Johnny Depp. To convince a nervous wealthy woman to make the right choice and not the Devil’s, he reassures her: “To be reborn, first you must die. All of them have achieved a kind of immortality. And we love them all the more for it. They won’t get old or fat. They won’t get sick or feeble. They are beyond fear. They are forever young. They are gods. And you can join them.” It is not certain if this dialogue was written before or after Ledger’s death, but ultimately Health Ledger was one of the few perfect, or nearly perfect, actors the cinema has been witness to. “Nothing is permanent, not even death.” Ledger has died, yes, but, as the cinema has and will continue to do, performers like Ledger are immortalized. They are beyond fear, and they become gods. Terry Gilliam has struggled with the film gods, but they now smile on him, and hopefully, with Heath Ledger among them, will continue to do so.

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