Alice in Wonderland

This version of Lewis Carroll's literary classic is the 30th animated adaptation from Australian animation company Burbank Studios. Unfortunately, they don't come close to their best performances so far with this film adaptation. Of course, shortening Carroll's main work to 51 minutes is also a difficult undertaking, but it is above all the colorfulness of the story, the madness associated with the visuality and the explosion of creativity that is difficult, if not difficult, in the Burbank films that are often very scaled down in general is impossible to grasp. Richard Trueblood might not have been the best choice at this point either, since up until then he had been more involved with individual episodes of well-known cult classics from the cartoon world of the 80s and had no experience with film concepts that should stand for themselves. For Trueblood himself, the point of view is certainly the other way around, so that a Burbank project was probably a good introduction to the world of cartoons for him. He could probably try it out safely, but also with little resources.

The result is a film that is unfortunately often very pale, with few background drawings, halting movements and such a shortened plot that the imagery of the novel hardly shines through. The superficial drawings of the characters aren't bad, but they can't keep up with the Disney classic on any level. The dialogues don't match the wit or the complexity of the original either, but the largest of all animation houses has already proven that this would be possible. In principle, the same applies to the song of the film, if you compare it with the great musical accompaniment of the Disney classic. But the mere fact that it is there speaks for the director's ambitions and it's not bad to listen to in the context given to it either.

So there is no terrible, but definitely a far removed version of "Alice in Wonderland" left, which simply has too many weaknesses and reminds too little of the intentions of the great author.

Now I know Burbank Films Australia are capable of making a good animation. I loved their Wind in the Willows and Peter Pan, but I wasn't sure what to make of their Alice in Wonderland. Granted it's better than the versions of The Three Musketeers, The Old Curiosity Shop and Prisoner of Zenda, but something was lacking here. I did like the theme song, it does repeat itself but it is a pleasant and catchy tune. The characters are more colourful and engaging than the Jetlag version especially Mad Hatter and Queen of Hearts, Alice herself is much less bland and while odd(purposefully) the Cheshire Cat is fun also. The animation is not too bad, while the character designs are on the scratchy side the backgrounds are quite colourful. The rest of the music aside from the song though is rather screechy and over-bearing, while the recording of the voices is I agree rather muted, which probably accounts for why some of the vocal work seemed uninterested. The writing doesn't quite give an over-simplified feeling like the Jetlag version did, but still feels as though it is lacking in thoughtfulness and wit. The story is more faithful in spirit to Jetlag's and while the dream-like feel is there, the oddball nature and the nuances of the story(which I have always considered one of the all-time greats) aren't quite. All in all, not bad as such but I am not sure whether I kind of like it or dislike it. 5/10 Bethany Cox

Perhaps it is true that an adult might notice the simplistic animation, overly loud soundtrack and somewhat muted voices. However children generally don't care about that and will absorb anything with bright colors and an upbeat storyline and I did like a sponge. This movie was wonderful to me and I would go through it probably once every two weeks on my video time cycle. It has a calm, dreamlike quality to it, but not an outlandish dream one always remembers like the book, but a regular every night dream. It doesn't do justice to the book- but it will capture a child.

This version offers a marginal/vague coherence to the story as we all know it. But as the film rolls, this vagueness begins to be increasingly troublesome when the other obvious deficits of the film begin to weigh in.

The soundtrack is poorly executed, reminding me of listening to a second rate TV station late at night, when the commercials are horrendously too loud in relation to the program. In this case, the musical score is loud, and the character voice track is muted, but the similarity is obvious to even a casual listener. And it is every bit as annoying, especially since you are viewing a package that is supposedly offered by a single entity, without advertisers inserting later leverage with after-the-fact dollars.

The animation is okay but not exceptional in any way. And it is a far cry from that in the original Disney classic. And the biggest problem is that the animation is the strong point for this version. The rest of it all trails off rather miserably after that.

The story is pretty badly corrupted, and the nuances of the original are largely lost in this very weak imitation. If you have seen the Disney original (and who hasn't?) then you will likely be sorely disappointed with this rendition. But there may be those who can dispute this. Who can say? If you have not seen the Disney feature, then the original story is so strong (even corrupted to this degree) that you might see this version as exceptional.