Showing posts with label Alice Through the Looking Glass. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Alice Through the Looking Glass. Show all posts

Thursday, January 5, 2017

Day 1466: A Completely Uninteresting Day



What happens when you're a blog writer but you have an absolutely, completely uninteresting day and end it with writer's block? The picture above isn't even from today, that's how uninteresting today was. After all, the most interesting things that happened to me today were a four hour study session of Beethoven's first symphony, my boyfriend bringing me a Christmas sweater that his Great Grandma previously owned, and going to Olive Garden at 9:30 at night for breadsticks, mozzarella sticks, and stuffed mushrooms. Other than that, I did lay by my fireplace and watch Parks & Recreation for a while because I was cold, but is that really any better? 

As my roommate just said though, "we're on break," and she's entirely right. As much as I spend a bunch of my time on breaks working on catching up on blog posts and videos and in general, sleep, that doesn't make for a very interesting day. At least, nothing compared to what I'll be up to next week when I'm actually in Florida for another nine days at Disney. 

But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that these completely uninteresting days, even when they have very little Disney in them, are necessary for us to really appreciate the truly magical ones. It's sort of like movies - not every single movie is going to hit it out of the park. Disney alone proves that with new films eleven out of the twelve months in 2016. Some of them, such as Finding Dory, Star Wars: Rogue One, and Captain America: Civil War did really well, ending out as the top three grossing films of 2016 in general. But others, such as Queen of Katwe, Alice Through the Looking Glass, and The BFG didn't fare as well, and while each may have been a good concept or film, there was something about them that was, at some point, uninteresting. 

Which is one of the characteristics I pay special attention to when I'm in the theaters seeing each film on opening weekend. When I'm viewing the film, I'm conscious of the moments where I lose my interest, and then at the end of the viewing I sort of count up how many times that happened. From there, I'm able to take that number into account as I determine how much I truly enjoyed the movie. A lull or two is good, great actually, because it allows us as viewers to process everything that's happened thus far in the film, but too many lulls just puts us to sleep, and, well, you get the idea. 

So maybe today, January 5, was a particularly uninteresting day in the Disney department, but I was still able to find enjoyment in the things I did, and that's just as important...especially when you live in Wisconsin and it's -23 degrees outside and you just feel really far away from Disney World. 

Have a magical day!

Friday, May 27, 2016

Day 1243: Through the Looking Glass


It's been a few years since the last Alice in Wonderland movie premiered and left many of us slightly confused as to what in the world was going on. Johnny Depp's performance was great, per usual, but all I remember about it was leaving the theater more confused than when I went in...which, perhaps, is exactly what an Alice in Wonderland film should be. The sequel seemed about the same to me: an enjoyable film that I'll probably never watch again.

Like usual, I headed to the theaters soon after release to see Alice Through the Looking Glass, and while there were very few people in the theater, those that were there all seemed to enjoy it. I really enjoyed Time as a character for reasons that I can't quite pin down, and while The Hatter almost got irritating at times, I loved Alice in this film. In the original I felt like her character was very one sided and flat, but here she just came alive, producing a definite highlight of the film for me.

All in all, this film just felt more colorful and upbeat than the first one, which really seems more in-tune with Wonderland. The backstory for the Hatter was interesting, and definitely kept me intent throughout the movie, but in the end I think that this also provided it's greatest flaw: the main character. The title is Alice Through the Looking Glass, but it seemed to me that the main character wasn't Alice at all. In fact, she was more of a side player who happened to save the main character: The Hatter. Considering the fact that Johnny Depp was really the stand-out star of the previous film, this isn't surprising, but at the same time it felt a bit off.

Plus, as an English major who's read Alice in Wonderland and Alice Through the Looking Glass both multiple times, I'm not entirely sure how accurate this all was to the original novel...

Truth be told, Alice Through the Looking Glass was indeed a good film, and I still recommend seeing it if you haven't already...although you could probably wait until it appears on Netflix someday just as easily.

Have a magical day!