Alice in Wonderland

As you watch the beginning of "Alice in Wonderland", pay close attention to the guests at the tea party. You might notice Martin Short and his companion, a man placing two buns atop his head as if he were, say, a March Hare. Notice also the man flirting with the woman at the end-you could almost call him a scurvy Knave. But enough with the plays on words. This version of "Alice in Wonderland" was exceedingly well done. From the moment Alice falls down the rabbit hole to the moment she catches the apple, we are spellbound by the fantasy the film has woven for us. Part of its appeal is its satirical notions. Consider the "caucus race", where everyone is cheating. Cynics of politics might agree with this. There is also the trial at the end, where the evidence is as insubstantial as a house of cards. One needs to watch the film or read the novel many times to pick up all of the references!

I enjoyed watching Alice's transformation from stage fright child to confident young girl. It was a continuing thread that helped the story attain a greater level of continuity. Yet the most entertaining portions of the film were those with Martin Short, Miranda Richardson, and Gene Wilder, to name a few. They held nothing back, which magnified the absurdities of their characters to the nth degree. Lastly, the featuring of the tea party at the beginning of the film and the end helped tie it together. A well done film.

I have seen the film it was shown over the easter weekend here and it's great i have seen many of the different versions when I was a child but this one is great the puppets and special effects in just two hours they managed to get two books in and it wasn't that much different to the version made in the 1970's except that one was musical,but it's just the same except for the new bits added on to the story.

Being a big fan of the books and the author's work, I have seen most of the film adaptations made of the Alice books (and yes, there were two), and this is one of the better adaptations, and certainly a wonderful film.

Filled with famous faces and some wonderful sets, it may not be 100% like the book, but I won't have a word against this film anyway. The writers make the same mistake of mixing the two books together (understandable), and throw in a few new morals and themes (stage fright, mostly), but it's still great. Folks like Gene Wilder, Pete Postlethwaite, Christopher Lloyd, Robbie Coltrane, Whoopi Goldberg, Ben Kingsley, Martin Short and others make their own contribution to this magical TV production.

The whole thing was an honest live action work that made a decent effort to correct what Disney messed up. Now, be fair, the animation was wonderful (very), but a terrible adaptation. So applaud yourselves, Halmi & Halmi (and everyone else, esp. Richard Hartley for music). You did a great job. And readers pick up a copy of the DVD, it's a great movie.

I am not entirely sure whether this version is the best version of the book, as I grew up on the Disney film. The book is a real delight, it is admittedly oddball, but it is charming and visionary with memorable colourful characters. That is the same for Through the Looking Glass, I do prefer Alice in Wonderland as a book, but Through the Looking Glass does have a nice narrative and the characters still have their appeal.

Back on target, this TV version is not bad at all. Actually it is decent. The length is rather excessive though making some scenes drag on a bit, and as sweet as it was the subplot about Alice being asked to sing at a party I had mixed feelings about. While it meant that Alice goes on a sort of journey in the film character-wise, it felt somewhat unnecessary. Plus in terms of performances, while I enjoyed the acting on the whole, Whoopi Goldberg as the Cheshire Cat disappointed me. She has the grin and her costume was wonderful, but she should have had more screen time.

However, there is lots to enjoy here. For a TV movie, the visuals are pretty amazing. The sets are really colourful, the landscapes are vivid, the special effects are fairly impressive and the costumes are visionary. And I found the music surprisingly memorable, quite sweet really. I know people have complained of the screenplay being poor, personally I didn't find that. I enjoyed spotting the quotes lifted from the books and the actors seemed to having fun with it. Some of the added lines didn't quite work as well, but they were entertaining. Likewise with the merging of the two books, I for one didn't find that a problem. The director also does a good job making Wonderland as magical, as odd and as dreamlike as it should be, and some scenes were very well directed, especially the Mock Turtle sequence, the Caccus race, the Hatter's tea party, the Walrus and the Carpenter and of course the courtroom scene.

The acting is also very enjoyable. Like Goldberg, Christopher Lloyd as the White Knight could've done with more screen time, but he does a very good job with what he has. Ben Kingsley is entertaining as Major Caterpillar, even if he did have some of the film's weakest dialogue, he delivers very well. Shiela Hancock, while she has been better, was fun as the Cook, a lot of shouting but hey she was fun. Tina Majorino I had no problem with as Alice, I sometimes find Alice in film adaptations bland but Majorino isn't bland, she is appealing and likable. Peter Ustinov is a perfect Walrus, likewise with Pete Postlethwaite as the Carpenter. Gene Wilder does fine also as the melancholy mock turtle, he started off a tad uncomfortable, no wonder with his costume as they are horrible to wear, but once he gets into the role he starts enjoying himself more. My favourite performances though were Miranda Richardson as a suitably shrill Queen of Hearts, Simon Russell Beale in a amusing turn as the King of Hearts and Martin Short as the somewhat eccentric Mad Hatter. Jason Flemying was also a riot as the Knave of Hearts as were Robbie Coltrane and George Wendt as Tweedledee and Tweedledum.

Overall, flawed but perfectly decent made for TV adaptation. 7/10 Bethany Cox

Lewis Carroll is a difficult author to adapt satisfactorily to the screen. Worse yet, most versions try to add some sort of lesson to the story that was never there to begin with. This, too uses a version that simply doesn't work. Alice does not want to have to sing "Cheery Ripe" so the whole film becomes about the importance of performing for an audience. That fails to really hold the film together. Despite this, this is probably the best-looking version of the two books yet. It does neither what the Children's Theatre Company did in 1982, and try to exactly mimic Tenniel's illustrations, nor that of the Harry Harris production, in which the actors had to be recognizable so they wore simple costumes with pig ears or rabbit ears, etc. Here there is a mix of puppetry and mere suggestion. Many of the minor anthropomorphics simply bear resemblance to whatever animal they were supposed to be, such as there was the use (again) of an all-star cast. It frequently makes fun of the fact that many of the cast do not speak in an English accent, though the American actor playing Alice does. The film, however, has beautiful cinematography and visionary effects. The early sequence in the library seems like the Halmis are trying to out-Gulliver their adaptation of Book III of Gulliver's Travels. The extreme visuals begin with the giant metronome at the beginning and carry all sorts of wonderful metaphor. Odd jump cuts and strange reflections don't look like goofs, but contribute to weirdness. A storm like _The Neverending Story_'s Nothing forces her to move on in her dream world to escape. The sped-up photography for the White Rabbit seems a nod to _El Gatto con Botas_, and of course, it's tied together like MGM's version of _The Wizard of Oz_. Like all films of these books, it has good elements and poorly handled elements, and certainly there is no definitive version, but this is one of the more interesting ones.