Mesmerizing Visuals + The Red Queen = Enjoyable Movie!

Rating: 7/10 (19 March 2010)

Alice in Wonderland is a fantasy movie based on the Lewis Carroll's book "Through the Looking-Glass". The point of a movie following the second book ? Whatever.... The story itself is done let's say good for an 1 hour and half movie. I expected a little bit more of it but at the end I was quite entertained and satisfied with the result. It was magical but not that magical, it was a happy movie and not made to be a serious weirdness but more of a crazy wildness.
Tim Burton succeeded to transform Alice's story into an epic visual experience. The best part of the movie is that the visual effects (especially in 3D) were mastered wonderful. The beauty of the environments along with the 3D effects threw you into an mesmerizing world. As I said the visual experience was top notch but the acting was even better.
The Red Queen portrayed by Helena Bonham Carter stole the show. She was magnificent and each scene with her was awesome. Seems like Tim Burton's "fetish" for his wife to appear in his movies succeeded this time on a big level. The Mad Hatter played by Johnny Depp wasn't that Mad and I think I expected more from him though his portrayal is on point as usual. I didn't really liked Mia as Alice. Don't know why but I can't find her attractive enough to really enjoy her presence on the screen and her acting as Alice wasn't that great. Another character I enjoyed was Cheshire the Cat which was so cool to watch.
The ridiculous moment of the movie were I was like "OH snap! What the hell?" was on Depp's dancing... I mean breakdance? modern dance moves? Why that? And that music? ...I think that simple scene ruined big part from the movie. The music was cut and edited well during the movie, but I still try to figure out why Tim Burton had not asked for an entire composed soundtrack. That would have fitted this world so much better.
About the CGI, I noticed some mistakes, like the horse-riding looks so animated....which I think they could have just used a real horse. Some of the fight scenes were poor cut and so on, but in the end we could skip on that.
In the end ... this movie is not such a great adaptation by Tim Burton, not such of an extraordinary movie but a wonderful visual experience along with one great performance by the Red Queen.
I'd give it a 7,5 but I can't so I gave it an 8 to raise the bar.