On the Frabjous Day, He Will Futterwacken Vigarously...

Rating: 6/10 (9 July 2010)

Alice Kingsleigh (Mia Wasikowska) is 19 and has suffered from strange dreams for half her life. She's an intelligent girl with little interest in the strict rules and etiquette of Victorian England; her unconventional thoughts bring disdain from those around her. She's expected to marry an arrogant British lord and she's unhappy with the direction her life is heading. On the afternoon of her engagement party, she runs off after a white rabbit and, after a short trip down a rabbit hole, finds herself in Underland. She discovers from the strange inhabitants that the land is under the tyrannical rule of the Red Queen (Helena Bonham Carter) and it is believed she is the "Alice" destined to defeat the Queen's Jabberwocky and bring freedom from her reign.
All right, just to clarify, I've never read any of Lewis Carroll's original stories and I've had minimal exposure to Disney's 1951 animated film. Still, seeing as how I haven't spent my life under a rock, I know enough of the basics. As I understand, 2010's ALICE is a sequel of sorts, not a reboot and reimagining of the original story. The story's not bad, I suppose. I was digging the movie for the first hour or so, as Alice wanders through Underland and we're introduced to the interesting characters scattered throughout. That's about all that kept me interested, the characters and world design, since the story itself was pretty thin.
The casting for the film was fantastic, though some of them have been staples of Burton films and were a given. Most people speak of Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter; Depp does a great job but we all know he can play the weirdest of characters. This wasn't really a stretch for him and, after having seen his performance here, I'm itching to see him in a serious role again. Carter was fun as the Red Queen with her mega-cranium and her obsession with lopping off heads of anyone who so much as looks at her wrong. Crispin Glover was probably my favorite in the film (and almost unrecognizable) as Stayne, the knave of hearts who's flirtations with the Queen keep him in her good graces. We also run the full gamut of full-CG characters, from the hilariously manic March Hare to Absolem the hookah-smoking caterpillar (voiced by the awesome Alan Rickman, who almost seemed to be disinterestedly phoning in his performance here).
Despite what everyone around me seems to claim, this is nowhere near Tim Burton's best film. Sure, it's amazing to look at; the characters are beautifully designed (I can't stop staring at the oddness that are the Tweedles...) and the landscape is equal parts twisted and beautiful. Unfortunately for the film, that's all it is. It's an enjoyable watch but it feels empty at the end. It doesn't help that, after all the strange and colorful interactions that fill the film, it ends with an action sequence. It totally weakened the last half hour and I lost interest at that point, and the CG for the Jabberwocky was the only CG in the film that stood out (in a bad way).
Be warned: you should be prepared to watch the film in subtitles. Between the gibberish of the Underland language and Depp's tendency to slip into a thick Scottish brogue during the Hatter's moments of angry lucidity, there were some parts I just couldn't understand watching in theaters without the aid of subtitles to help (most of) it make more sense.