There's a few general themes and motifes that I love:
- people who are possibly crazy/hallucinating
- sad, mentally ill little girls
- Felicity Huffman
And when you put all of these together, you get a movie tailor made for me. Phoebe In Wonderland may have felt about 20 minutes too long-and I say felt because the movie is relatively short, it just FEELS long towards the end-but other than that this thing is great start to finish. Elle Fanning plays Phoebe, a girl with-clearly-some sort of mental illness and her family as they cope with her acting out at school after she gets the lead in the school play for Alice In Wonderland. The film is brightly colored, vibrant and yet has this sad undertone that somehow doesn't manage to run the bubbly film completely off the rails, which is rare.
The cinematography is OUTSTANDING. Whoever shot this thing should be proud as hell for themselves, because this is one of the most gorgeous films I think I've ever seen. Everything is surreal, and magical and yet realistic. Bravo to you. The film does tend to drag in some spots but it's not often, and for the most part the pacing is pretty good, and the acting is absolutely top notch from everyone involved, including the kids which is not something I praise often. Child actors are usually hit and miss (and more miss often than not, sadly) but every kid in this is pretty outstanding, which is a true achievement in and of itself. Now, perhaps it's because I dealt with a lot of this kind of stuff myself when I was a child that I'm more biased towards the plight of the lead but I don't think that's it. I'm really trying to be as unbiased as possible, and I really do think if you DON'T feel bad for this girl, you have no soul.
Some of the scenes when she's sad, or being consoled by Felicity Huffman (who played her mother) are just heartwrenching. 10/10 would tear up again.
I think this movie has some very good statements, especially with the best line in the film from Huffman to the child psychologist at one point, which is thusly: "You're so ready to put a label on things; medicate and move on. Your field is so scared to just let kids be kids."
As someone who's ex is in school studying for child psychology and someone who's been to therapists on and off since her childhood myself, I COMPLETELY agree. While there's obviously people in the field who do care and want to help children-and as Huffman herself eventually admits, some children DO need help-there's a LOT of kids who are highly over medicated or wrongly diagnosed simply because they're different or do things that adults don't think kids should be doing.
SPOILER It's revealed towards the end of the film that Phoebe has tourettes syndrome, but at one point-after watching her daughter count rocks and wash her hands multiple times, and thinking it was OCD-Huffman says to her husband: "When I was a child, I counted telephone poles from the backseat of our car and if I missed one we'd crash and die. It's just what kids do." I couldn't agree more here either. We all had imaginary friends as kids and we all lived in a fantasy type world at one time or another (unless you had no imagination at all whatsoever, in which case, I feel sorry for you, truly) so it's ridiculous that we just label children today with medical problems before realizing, "Wait, they're children..."
The acting is superb, the cinematography is top notch, the MUSIC IS OUTSTANDING and overall the film is gorgeous to watch and a very pleasing viewing.
I HIGHLY recommend this film.
FINAL GRADE
A+
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