Awesome, but could use improvement

Rating: 7/10 (4 June 2010)

Okay, for the record, I liked this movie. Now, I didn't like everything about it. However, overall, I did.
Maybe it's because I have not yet read the original Alice in Wonderland stories. (I was sad when I saw the end of the Lord of the Rings since I knew how it really ended). Or maybe it's because I normally dislike Tim Burton's movies since I find them too disturbing (yeah, I know, shocker.) Maybe it's because I could see what the screenwriter was trying to do with this movie since I, too, have a screen writing background. Because, you see, her interpretation of the story was supposed to be different; this is Alice 13 years after the original story takes place.
So with that in mind - since I am not a Lewis Carroll purist and am typically not a Tim Burton fan - please consider what I have to say.
I do agree that the story was predictable. Alice gets told she is to kill the Jabberwocky, she fights this idea throughout the movie, but in the end she decides to go ahead, find the courage, and do as prophecied. I know - that seems boring and unexciting. I also agree that Mia Wasikowski's performance needed some fine-tuning; I cringed a bit when she did the fudderwhacken for her father's business partner at the end. It was totally unnecessary, and for me did not add anything to the story.
However, I believe this story was about finding courage to be more than what you have been told you are. And I can tell you from personal experience: self-doubt is not an easy place to be. So, to me, the way Mia portrayed Alice's struggle with her self-confidence and her own doubts about Wonderland being real, thinking it was yet again a dream, was spot on. I appreciate this actress for her great showing of tough emotions that are normally hard to get across on screen. I think some of her "wooden" acting, as people are claiming it to be, was really her way of showing her character's doubts and lack of courage. So I do see promise in this particular actress. She is young, after all, and I think she'll grow and mature in her weaker areas.
What I also liked was the fact that these well-loved characters were more true to life than before. I may not know what they were like originally, and I will concede that I am ignorant on that. But I could see that Tim Burton was paying homage to the original Disney version of the movie and trying to ground each of them in reality. I liked seeing the Red Queen having a softer, more vulnerable side (on her rare occasions), and in those times she reminded me more of Queen Elizabeth than the Queen of Hearts. I also liked Anne Hathaway's touch of the White Queen also appearing mad in various places in the movie. Now, I can't fully trust the White Queen to be a good queen to Wonderland, since she did seem calculating and mechanical in most of her scenes. And I do agree that I hated how Hathaway kept carrying her arms in that awkward ballet position; Hathaway is more graceful without all of the arm dramatics. But I could see what Hathaway was getting at with her performance.
Basically, what I am trying to say is that there is more depth and realness in this movie - alongside the amazing visual effects - than one would first expect. And that is another reason to go see this movie.
I will concede that there were definite goofs in this movie, primarily in some of the acting. Johnny Depp is hilarious, but in this movie he seemed to be repeating some of the same things he did in Willy Wonka. Wrong movie. And while I normally like Anne Hathaway's movies, I would have preferred someone else playing the White Queen. I also wondered what the heck the scriptwriter was thinking with Lord of the Rings and Narnia homages here and there (like the dead faces in the water near the castle, or some of the same actors from the same movies - like Chris Lee as the jabberwock and Marton Csokas as Alice's father). This story should have been something from its own making.
But, here's the thing. Wonderland IS a fabulous, visual fantasy, and Helena Bonham Carter's acting blew me away. I saw this movie for a second time yesterday, and lots of people in the auditorium clapped at the end. There must have been something they liked, as I did.