WONDERLAND

By: Abbie Bernstein
Review Date: Friday, October 03, 2003

The gods of movie titles, if no one else, were smiling about the location of a multiple homicide that occurred in the Laurel Canyon area of L.A. in the summer of 1981. The crime occurred on Wonderland Avenue, and Wonderland is not a bad description of the drugged-out, through the looking glass world surrounding the tragedy, which achieved notoriety both due to the incredible ferocity of the killings four people beaten to death and one survivor hospitalized for months afterwards and to the possible involvement of one-time porn movie superstar John Holmes.

WONDERLAND the movie introduces us to the Wonderland Avenue scene, with Holmes (Val Kilmer) depicted as an addict who can still fully enjoy some aspects of life like his much younger girlfriend Dawn Schiller (Kate Bosworth) while largely drifting around in a haze of unpaid-for drugs and petty humiliations at the hands of others. The primary dealers on the scene are partners Ron Launius (Josh Lucas) and David Lind (Dylan McDermott), who become irate when Holmes claims he can raise money for the household by selling Ron's antique guns to wealthy club owner and alleged gangster Eddie Nash (Eric Bogosian), then comes back (eventually) with a pittance. The film takes a RASHOMON-like approach to what happens next Lind swears to police that Holmes is a devil who purposefully orchestrated both a robbery of Nash and Nash's subsequent retaliation, while Holmes paints himself as a coerced innocent in the extraordinarily bloody killings that ensue.

WONDERLAND works

intermittently as a character study and as a murder mystery. It intrigues throughout, thanks to director James Cox's convincing, you-are-there style and the verisimilitude of his cast. Lisa Kudrow is especially impressive as Holmes' estranged wife, who is appalled by his porn career, let alone the following chaos, but can't quite say goodbye; Ted Levine is great as a very patient detective who's on the case. However, the filmmakers seem rather uncertain about just how much (if at all) they want to attribute the Wonderland massacre to Holmes' rather odd era in showbiz. There is discussion of Holmes' claims of having had sex with 14,000 women, but it's unclear if we're meant to infer this has desensitized himself to everything around him (from the scenes between Holmes and Dawn, it doesn't appear to have desensitized him to actual sex) or if we're meant to draw an even more oblique cause-and-effect connection. More peculiar still, one of the most relevant questions raised the fallout (and lack thereof) of Nash's contribution to the murders is dealt with primarily in a written postscript, with little explanation; we get not much more screen time for a closing credits scrawl explaining that one of the key figures eventually spoke up, after remaining silent during all that we see.

Kilmer does an expert job of disappearing into Holmes he's willing to appear messed-up, clueless and petulant as called for, blending in seamlessly with the ensemble. In the end, WONDERLAND succeeds on the strength of persuasive ambience and an overall look at a toxic environment. For all the different possible versions of events, we get the feeling that who did what isn't all that important all roads here lead to a burning Rome.

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