Paul Mazursky's 8 1/2 homage

ALEX IN WONDERLAND (1970)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

"Alex in Wonderland" is a free-floating film, devoid of specific purpose or intent other than showing that one man cannot make up his mind about what to do next. Donald Sutherland plays a movie director whose first film has not yet been released, and already he has to consider what his sophomore effort will be. Hmmm.

After Paul Mazursky scored with his debut film, "Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice," he made this picture in 1970. There is the quote at the start from Lewis Carroll's own "Alice in Wonderland" about how Alice had changed several times since the morning and, currently, she has no idea who she is. Only Mazursky's film is not precisely about this - it is about a man who has no idea what film to make. He knows who he is, I think, but he cannot decide what story to shoot next. Should it about a black revolutionary, a Navajo reservation or, as his oldest daughter suggests, a film about how he can't decide what to film? No, as he correctly suggests, that has already been done in Fellini's "8 1/2."

Speaking of Fellini, the master Italian director appears as himself at his own film editing bay, impatiently trying to ward off Alex's questions such as what three foods Fellini would eat on a deserted island! That one scene epitomizes the struggles and realities of making a film than most of Mazursky's own film. And for fans of Jeanne Moreau, she makes a welcome appearance as herself, and sings two songs.

I am not dismissing "Alex in Wonderland," in fact, there are some wonderful, watchable sequences. I love Alex's own marital squabbles that mostly include how his wife (Ellen Burstyn) places household chores as priority over his pontificating over story ideas. I also love the Felliniesque backgrounds of Alex's imagination, which include Alex dressed as a Pope and numerous parades that include clowns. There is also a harrowing sequence that involves the Vietnam War being fought on the L.A. streets while the Beatles' concert film, "Let it Be," is shown to be playing at a theatre marquee. And the two isolated moments with Alex's blunt mother (Viola Spolin) are riveting. But mostly the film drifts off into Alex's own speeches on what makes a story work and they are not particularly enthralling or memorable. The truth is that a real film director thinks visually all the time, and makes excuses to justify every single idea they have as a monumental and important one. When Alex is stuck in the wonderland of his imagination, I was more often mesmerized than not. Mazursky's own "8 1/2" homage rates a mere 7 1/2.