[Dancecult-l] Welcome to Wonderland

[Graham St John]

I recently wrote this review about the film:

Welcome to Wonderland

Welcome to Wonderland is unique in the world of psy-trance films. 
I've viewed many psy-trance documentaries in recent times. Most are 
promotional, endorsements for event organisations or particular 
artists. Some are full of bravado, bristling with machismo and 
boasters embodied by DJs portrayed as shaman priests. But if shamanic 
consciousness is apparent in psy-trance, and quite a few propose that 
it is, it would be discovered right there on the dance floor: where 
egos are dissolved, limits trespassed and identities transformed. 
Like no other film on psy-trance culture Welcome to Wonderland 
penetrates this difficult membrane, exposes the organic machinery, 
capturing the heart of dance, or more specifically, the social 
characteristics of modern trance dance.

James Short's film about the Melbourne psy-trance scene, a product of 
6 years work, does not sell itself as an ethnographic film - but it 
passes as one nevertheless. And it does so because it is a grassroots 
film, dedicated in its pursuit of a milieu of people from various 
backgrounds and ages, through some of the most outrageous, intimate 
and self-annihilating moments of their lives. Recording comments and 
gesticulations with careful attention to detail cut to a fine sound 
track, the film enables participants to narrate their stories and 
allows viewers access to the 'participation mystique' momentarily 
transparent in the primal real estate between the speaker stacks at 
majestic bush and forest locations at Australia's Rainbow Serpent and 
Earthcore Festivals. The film records a momentous locomotional 
transit into the new millennium at the Earthcore Millennial party at 
Lake Eildon. With a great score that includes work by Sugar and Ben 
Last, and an excellent series of dance montages and interviews, this 
film should not be missed by any trance enthusiast or indeed anyone 
interested in electronic dance music culture.

More about the film: and view the trailer:
http://www.welcometowonderland.com/


Graham
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