DVD Reviews

Alice In Wonderland

• Rating:
• Director: Tim Burton
• Starring: Johnny Depp
• Details: US/108mins PG

Are you a Tim Burton fan? If you are, chances are no matter what I say here you'll be first in line for his latest big budget attempt at transferring his eccentricities onto celluloid. This is, of course, another adaptation, and one that on paper would appear to appeal massively to Burton's obvious gothic sensibilities; but Alice In Wonderland is lazy, disengaging and ultimately a disappointment. By no means a terrible film - it's full of impressive effects and Mia Wasikowska's Alice is a joy - it just never really immerses you in its world.
It's over a decade since Alice was last in Wonderland, and she's grown uninterested in daily life since her father passed away. Whilst attending an engagement party that her mother failed to inform her was actually for her and her suitor, she spots a rabbit in a waistcoat. Being human, she follows the rabbit down a big hole, and finds herself in a dangerous, but invigorating new world. Once there she's accused of being the "wrong Alice," by the land's strange inhabitants, but soon makes a pal in Johnny Depp's Mad Hatter. Alice finds Wonderland has changed as the dastardly, giant-headed queen is now running the show instead of her less aggressive sister. And she wants Alice's head on a plate.
Following essentially the same overtly idiosyncratic format as the shoddy Charlie and the Chocolate factory remake, Depp could be playing the exact same character here for all we know. Essentially a supporting player, his Mad Hatter is still given decidedly more depth than any of the other peripheral characters - you will never want to stamp on a mouse more in your life than when listening to the squeals coming from Barbara Windsor's cantankerous rodent.
On the plus side, Mia Wasikowska's distant performance is a delight, and the actress, so wonderful as a troubled teen in In Treatment, shows a deft hand at conveying simultaneous disinterest and wonderment. Anne Hathaway meanwhile was obviously given physical quirks by Burton to enhance her character that just don't work; in her defence, she doesn't have a lot of screentime to help her cause.
Tim Burton really needs to branch out and do something different. Audiences will begin to grow tired of his identical casting and lazy choices that show a surprising lack of imagination. His last truly wonderful film was Big Fish, while you'd have to go back to the early 90's to find something similarly as good. When he starts challenging himself again, audiences might go with him.

Review by Mike Sheridan