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Alice In Wonderland 3D (Film)
Rating: M
Running Time: 108
Country: USA
Director: Tim Burton
Cast: Helena Bonham Carter, Johnny Depp, Michael Sheen, Mia Wasikowska
Distributor: Walt Disney
Film Worth: $10.50
Release Date: March 04, 2010
The cast do their best, but Disney has sanitised the wonderful world of Tim Burton
When he started his career, director Tim Burton worked as an animator at Walt Disney, slaving away on productions such as The Black Cauldron and The Fox And The Hound. Though the studio was initially supportive of Burton (financing his short films, Vincent and Frankenweenie), they were ultimately too confused by his dark visions to carry on the relationship. Burton left Disney and subsequently carved a career as one of Hollywood's most original and innovative directors.
Well, after classics like Edward Scissorhands, Ed Wood and Beetlejuice, Burton is back at Walt Disney for Alice In Wonderland, and it looks like the studio still doesn't quite comprehend the nature of the bats that ricochet around Burton's belfry. Despite having one of the weirdest, most wonderful novels in history at his disposal, this 3-D, CGI extravaganza is Burton's flattest, least inspired work in years, sitting on a par with the wholly underwhelming Big Fish. You can sense the clean, sanitised influence of Disney all over Alice In Wonderland, with Burton's natural eccentricity present and accounted for, but hardly there in spades.
While the cruelty and inspired weirdness of Lewis Carroll's various Alice In Wonderland source novels is hinted at, this is really just another big budget "event" movie, which rides on obvious messages about being yourself and striking out on your own, like a hundred other Disney family flicks. The performers, however, really bring it all to life.
Young Australian actress Mia Wasikowska is wonderful as the headstrong Alice, boasting an effortless on-screen charisma, and giving her wide-eyed naïf a little steel and backbone as well. Aside from being unrecognisable, Johnny Depp is strangely subdued as The Mad Hatter, with his characteristic energy seemingly lost in a flood of CGI trickery. Depp's eyes have unwisely been freakishly enlarged and distorted, robbing him of his most vital actorly instrument, and despite Depp's best efforts, The Mad Hatter never really catches fire as a character. Helena Bonham Carter fares much better as The Red Queen, remaining puckishly nasty and unforgiving through the entire film, and delivering all of its best comic moments. Voice work courtesy of Alan Rickman, Stephen Fry and Michael Sheen is equally impressive, and Anne Hathaway is engagingly kooky as The White Queen.
Alice In Wonderland is most certainly a lot of fun, with flashes of comic spark and occasionally interesting visuals, but considering the array of talent on hand, this tea party has been seasoned with a little too much sugar, and not enough spice.
