(Saskia Axten as Alice in Alice, through the Looking. Image from the trailer)
Down went Alice after the rabbit, never once considering how in the world she was to get out again....
The official trailer for Adam Donen's political AIW for adults, Alice, Through the Looking was released a few weeks ago. This trailer is for the POFF festival in Estonia, where the film will have its World Premiere in mid November (November 25th to be exact!)No UK release date has been set, but as always this post will be updated if that changes.
Press synopsis (from POFF Festival):
Alice, Through the Looking: À la recherche d'un lapin perdu Composer-turned-director Adam Donen brings his pleasingly bizarre, Brexit-referencing Alice in Wonderland retelling to Black Nights for its world premiere. Leading us through this new reality is the soothing voice of Vanessa Redgrave as narrator, alongside Slavoj Žižek, among many other surprises, visual and auditory.
Set in London on the day of the 2016 referendum on EU membership, philosophy student Alice loses her newfound boyfriend Rabbit and has to search for him in an upside down version of London which is part Wonderland, part post Brexit anxiety landscape.
Trailer can be watched here. (TW: trailer contains some strong language and sex, so potentially slightly NSFW)
Official film site (with links to social media) here.
My thoughts:
- At first glance this looks very, very different to every AIW character using film or adaptation. Alice is 20 here and in a romantic and sexual relationship with Rabbit (this element reminds me of the 1982 film Alicja, where a grown up Alice was also in love with a man called rabbit, however the relationship looks slightly more explicit here)
- Wonderland-Brexit-London is also depicted as being a somewhat harsh place (the politicians laughing at the end of the trailer, the bloodstained Queen) than is traditionally seen. Add to this the carrollian voice over of the elderly lady (paraphrasing a line from carroll) and the tonal shift is very deliberately marked. Sections of the film appear to feature characters not from Carroll, signalling that this might be a half adaptation or character using film only (we don't know yet)
- However this trailer also includes several elements that will be familiar to most carroll fans, namely the function of the mirror, the fun scene with the caterpillar private detective (still in keeping with Carroll's ideas) and the brief shots of Dum and Dee as policemen. Whilst its certain this version will go to darker places than expected (due to the political context) there is also an eccentric, off the wall tone in this trailer too.
- Despite the Carroll characters looking different from how we might expect, the look and costumes of the Queen and Alice echo their tenniel originals.
- The press notes state that at one point in this film Alice splits into three people. Again this personality split appears to be inspired by Carroll.
