Alice au pays des merveilles

There have been many adaptations of Lewis carol's work. However, I believe this version is the most enjoyable of all. Both children and adults will find this film entertaining. This version has a unique opening/closing envelope. With the ending showing that her dream had actually changed Alice's persona: "from now on I'll be the me I never knew." Unlike Irwin Allen's 1985 version (which amalgamated "Wonderland" and "Looking Glass" together) or the special-effects over-ridden 1999 version, this film takes the best of the Wonderland story and displays it with a richness that is pleasant and memorable. The addition of John Barry's (better known for his score's to the early James Bond films) music only adds to the sense of wonder that we share with Alice in her adventure. The music indeed elevates this version to the status of art in the truest sense rather than just another movie. Heck, it was better than the one Disney came out with -- that should say a lot.

Interesting fact, this film features Micheal Crawford as the WHITE RABBIT. Better known for his roles, Frank Spencer in "Some Mothers do Ave Em" and the Phantom in the stage production of Andrew Lloyd Webber's "The Phantom of the Opera." A curious footnote on his carrier.

While this adaptation has a plethora of talent in front of and behind the camera, including impressive sets, costumes, make-up and dazzling special effects, it has two main flaws.

First is William Sterling's hesitant direction, not knowing when to pick up the pace or cut a number that's not working; overall, there's a sense of lag and lethargy. His credits show that this was his last theatrical release (though this fate should have befallen any number of directors over the years).

Second, is the fact that this is a musical. Now, you might expect that with John (Dances With Wolves, Body Heat, James Bond) Barry handling the tunes, that there would be some outstanding music and you'd be right (the arrangement of "The Me I Never Knew" alone is powerful enough to demand that this music be re-released on CD!). The "musical" works best when Barry is allowed to put Carroll's words to music. It falters, however, as does too many minutes of the film, when he's forced to put music to long-time collaborator, Don Black's lyrics. Black is no novice, having won an Oscar for his lyrics to Barry's Born Free, but these songs are tack-ons, fillers; they don't work and Barry/Black have a thankless task trying to make them do so (it would be like writing a musical to Shakespeare and throwing out The Bard's lyrics).

Fiona Fullerton is a handsome Alice, and while her singing isn't professional, it has an endearing warmth. Her voice improved as she became a pretty and capable British stage actress, excelling in, yes, musicals.

Barry/Black went to better success with the UK stage hit, Billy.

This is perhaps the most faithful version of Alice in Wonderland. The dialogue is practically verbatim and the visuals are made to resemble the original illustrations drawn by John Tenniel. Composer John Barry provides the story with a collection of beautifully enchanting songs, many of which are straight out of the book.

The cast is more like a convention of every popular British performer known at that time, including a pre-Phantom Michael Crawford as the White Rabbit, Peter Sellers as a hilariously insane March Hare, Dudley Moore as the Dormouse, Robert Helpmann as the Mad Hatter (aka the Child Catcher for moviegoers, aka Royal Ballet for ballet-goers), and humorist Spike Milligan as the Gryphon. Fiona Fullerton plays a delightfully impressionable Alice, despite the fact that she is much older than the Alice of the book.

This movie is perfect for children and adults who want to see a literal translation of the book, made back in the days when moviemakers truly cared about entertaining audiences (and it's fun to wonder how they made Alice grow and shrink when they didn't have the aid of computer effects)!

Despite the widely held opinion that the material is unfilmable, Lewis Carroll's fantasy/nonsense classics Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There (1871) have frequently been dramatized for films and television. Although few of these productions have successfully translated Carroll's verbal and intellectual experimentation into cinema, several are of superior quality and hold an under-appreciated place in the history of the fantastic film.

The initial rejection of Walt Disney's Alice in Wonderland (1951) must have seemed like a final and irrefutable validation of the dictum that any film based on this work of literature -- even one produced under the auspices of a major creative force -- is a doomed proposition. Yet, twenty-one years later, British producer Joseph Shaftel dared to attempt another major theatrical film version as a belated celebration of the centennial of one of England's greatest national literary treasures. This visually beautiful musical brings John Tenniel's famous illustrations to vivid life and is in general the best live-action film version of the classic. Approached in the proper spirit this literate film is a magical experience.

Carroll's characters are played by a distinguished all-star cast including Michael Crawford (the White Rabbit), Dudley Moore (the Dormouse), Ralph Richardson (the Caterpillar) and Peter Sellers (the March Hare), with Michael Hordern, Spike Milligan, Dennis Price and Flora Robson. Robert Helpmann (the wicked ChildCatcher of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang) played the Mad Hatter and also choreographed.

Teenage Fiona Fullerton was an ideal Alice for the film, bringing beauty, warmth and a soft, winsome quality to the neurotic (and difficult) character. Fullerton had previously been seen as one of the daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra in the 1971 film, which incidentally starred Michael Jayston, who appears here as "Lewis Carroll/Rev. Dodgson". As an adult Fullerton starred opposite Richard Harris in a major London revival of Camelot, and appeared as a gorgeous Bond Girl in A View to a Kill.

The film's cinematic distinction is its extraordinarily beautiful photography by Geoffrey Unsworth, B.S.C. (2001: A Space Odyssey; Cabaret), whose graceful images and fluid, balletic camera movements create a dream-like atmosphere. Equally striking is the imaginative production design by Michael Stringer (Fiddler on the Roof), who made the most of a moderate budget to create a spectacular artificial Wonderland plainly influenced by The Wizard of Oz (1939). As with Oz, elaborate character makeups and costumes carefully expose the personalities of the performers, unlike the stiff masks which stifle the actors in the 1933 Paramount version. And the film boasts some eye-popping (pre-CGI) special effects, with Alice's changes in size being impressively executed.

The haunting orchestral score by John Barry, then best known for The Lion in Winter and the James Bond films, finds the contrasting emotional mood underlying the cool cerebral surface. There is sprightly music enough but the score reflects a wistful, eerie and otherworldly quality evocative of Carroll's theme of loss of childhood. Original songs by Barry and Don Black (the "Born Free" team) include "Curiouser and Curiouser", which establishes the theme of the child awakening through bewilderment to new awareness, and "The Me I Never Knew", which poignantly resolves that theme.

The scenario, by director William Sterling, is very faithful Carroll's first "Alice" book, although a scene with the Cheshire Cat was cut prior to release, and Tweedledum and Tweedledee (from Through the Looking Glass) are included for good measure. Every major episode and character are retained, with dialogue taken verbatim from the text. New to the story is a prologue and epilogue dramatizing the famous Fourth of July river excursion undertaken by Lewis Carroll (in his real-life guise as the Rev. Charles L. Dodgson of Christ Church, Oxford), Rev. Duckworth, and the three Liddell Sisters, Lorina, Alice and Edith, in the course of which was told for the first time the story of Alice's Adventures Under Ground. This lovely sequence is imaginatively blended in the film with the tale itself.

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland was made at a time when the British film industry was rapidly dying. The film debuted in America at the Chinese Theater in Hollywood, was greeted with condescension by critics, and vanished into undeserved obscurity. Its value as a sincere and true reproduction of Carroll has not gone entirely unappreciated, however, and has been accorded a degree of respect in scholarly studies. Originally stunning in Todd-AO 35 widescreen, the film is badly in need of restoration and a decent DVD re-release.

i first saw this version of carroll's tale as a child on thanksgiving day, and i did not forget how much i enjoyed it. i caught it years later as a teenager on cable, taped it, and did not grow tired of watching it repeatedly. i think that this movie adaption is the best and most faithful to the book that i have seen. the pace is brisk, the songs are lively, the overall musical score is very nice (especially "the me i never knew"), the acting is acceptable, the costume design and sets work well (with the exception of using a painting of the palace that was supposed to be a shot of the real thing in one scene), and it is quite funny in some parts. overall, it was nicely done, and remains a film i can continue to watch repeatedly as an adult.