Wonderland (2003)

Genre: Drama

Directed by: James Cox

Cast: Val Kilmer, Kate Bosworth, Lisa Kudrow

Running time: 104 minutes

On July 1, 1981, four people were murdered in an apartment on Wonderland Avenue, in the Laurel Canyon section of Los Angeles, as retaliation for a robbery committed in gangster Eddie Nash’s house. Famous porn actor John Holmes, who was at that point a junky playing both parties involved in this tragic conflict to score some dope and money, was a suspected accomplice in these murders.

Val Kilmer offered a decent performance as John Holmes. He did not attain Jim Morrison-like levels here, but he was still good. Kate Bosworth was very good as Dawn Schiller, John Holmes’ underage girlfriend. She was very convincing as the young lost soul, looking for love in the wrong places and searching for something to hold on to.

As for the film itself, it is your generic dark crime drama that fails in telling a compelling story. It is very difficult, based on what is put on screen, to care for these characters in any way. By the end of the movie, it felt like nothing more than a lost opportunity. It could have been so much better.

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