Viewed in
2010 (2)
Premise
The Unholy Trinity (Tim Burton, Johnny Depp, Danny Elfman) reunite to make a live-action adaption of Lewis Carroll's books, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass.
Loved
Anne Hathaway's performance. The visual feast.
Liked
The very cool cast.
Thoughts
A fun and luscious film.
Like most Burton films, there were tons of weird, exciting, and darkly humorous scenes for the eyes to behold, usually at the cost of a good plot. Thanks to some fascinating special effects, the film makers created a wonderful, bizarre, and diverse world. All of it looked even cooler in 3D IMAX. I loved that for most of the film, Alice was, to quote the Mad Hatter, "always too big or too small". This added to the off-beat style of the film.
The awesome cast was full of Burton favorites, wonderful British actors, and unexpected actors. Words cannot describe how excited I was to see the immortal Crispin Glover as the awkwardly tall Prince of Knaves. Helena Bonham Carter was great, despite the visual bastardization of her figure, as the evil Queen of Hearts. I definitely dug all the Brits doing fine voice acting, especially Stephen Fry as the Cheshire Cat. Sadly, Alan Rickman and Christopher Lee were underused. Amusing that there were four Harry Potter alumni in the cast.
Obviously, the headliner was Johnny Depp as Mad Hatter. While he did exude the oddball performance that was expected for such a film, I do not know if it was truly noteworthy. This is probably a good thing, as he could have been so noticeably weird that it would have diminished the ensemble performance. Instead, the scene-stealer was the delightful Anne Hathaway as the White Queen. Her ditsy, hyper-posturing performance was extremely funny and nearly made me laugh out loud whenever she appeared on screen.
While the story was predictable, it at least had a semblance of a plot, and had a clear narrative. It felt like a genuine story, not an excuse to string together a bunch of trippy scenes.
This was superior to the 1951 "classic" in every way, except for the song (sadly no "Merry Unbirthday" here). The main difference was that the 2010 version had a plot, and the characters were fleshed out. In the 1951 version, it was a parade of bizarre, inconsequential creatures, and Alice's character was borderline hate-able. I'll bet the hardest part for Burton and company was how to make the iconic Cheshire Cat better than the original. And they pulled it off by going the subtle route.
Having bashed the 1951 version, I will admit that watching that movie beforehand greatly enhanced my experience in the current film. There were some wonderful shoutouts and twisting of famous lines that made me giggle. Granted, maybe these lines existed in the books. I have not read them.
Most called Burton's version a sequel. Based on the stand-alone plot, I disagree, and felt a little misled by the media on that aspect. This Alice is much older, but the film is easily standalone.
When I heard about this project at its inception that it would be Tim Burton doing live action 3D, I was ecstatic. After many months of self-hype, this film delivered. Like the title character, I was whisked away into a wonderfully weird world, thanks to Tim Burton's eye candy, and the cornucopia of cool characters.
What I would change
No talking doorknob?!
