WILLY’S WONDERLAND

Photo Source: Screen Media Films

Review By: Adam Mock

Director: Kevin Lewis Writer: G.O. Parsons Starring: Nicolas Cage, Emily Tosta, Beth Grant, Ric Reitz Rated: TV-MA

I’m not going beat around the bush with this review. Willy’s Wonderland is a fun pitch that was lucky enough to book Nicolas Cage just to beat up possessed animatronic mascots in a psuedo-Chuck E. Cheese without spewing a lick of dialogue. That is the movie. All of it. There are no actors of note (shy of character actress Beth Grant). The creatures, though practical, look like Build-A-Bear rejects. The plot is thinner than a paper bag on taco night, but, somehow, I completely didn’t deplore Willy’s Wonderland.

As stated previous, there is absolutely no story here. Well, there is, but it is summed up in a two minute flashback, and only to construct a reason to hire Nicolas Cage’s character to spend a night cleaning an evil children’s play place so he can psychotically dispatch killer robots (and not even interestingly).

Honestly, I heard about this mess and immediately watched the trailer. Suffice it to say, I was hooked and I knew this was going to be exactly what it advertised it self as, Nicolas Cage being Nic Cage to pay the bills. Unfortunately, that wasn’t really the case.

Now, I know this is an extremely stupid waste of time even talking about what is wrong with a movie about Nicolas Cage—you know the rest, but if you are reading this then you have some twisted vested interest in Willy’s Wonderland and want to know if it is worth your time. Short answer. No, not at all. The movie is dull and bad even in your typical bad movie parlances. But if you are, say, a Cage completist, the by all means. You know what you you’re in for. For all others in-between, I’m sure there is a compilation on YouTube of all the fight scenes condensed into a three minute clip. It’s really why you came to this party in the the first place, right?