I can't remember the last time I left a theater after a film feeling like everything was right but thinking something was really wrong.
I watched Tim Burton's "Alice in Wonderland" last weekend and I liked the whimsical special effects and dialogue and all that great stuff.
The acting was fine, the effects were fine and Johnny Depp was an awesome Mad Hatter.
But everything seemed so... not a surprise. Maybe someone can help me figure that out. Perhaps it was the remnants of my severe head cold keeping me from fully embracing the No. 1 "Alice," who took the top spot at the box-office for the third consecutive week with an estimated $34.2 million.
Of course, the sniffles didn't keep me from digging "Brooklyn's Finest" by director Antoine Fuqua ("Training Day"). I braved all two hours of the dark cop thriller on a full dose of DayQuil and when the credits rolled I wanted more....More "Brooklyn's Finest," not DayQuil.
Perhaps I'm lamenting the fact that we're going to get a lot more Wonderland-type films before we see more like Finest.
Moviegoers like me can sense when they are getting dealt another one of those flicks that are spoon-fed to you from a bowl of re-imagined ideas. Before "Brooklyn's Finest" the trailer for "Repo Men" played and when it was over I didn't quite know what to think.
A few seconds later, a guy in the back of the sparsely-filled theater shouted, "That's just terrible!"
I didn't say it, but I know how he felt.
ABOVE: L-R Johnny Depp, Mia Wasikowska and Anne Hathaway from "Alice in Wonderland." MIDDLE: Wesley Snipes and Don Cheadle in "Brooklyn's Finest."
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