‘Alice’ Not Worth Trip Down The Rabbit Hole

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March 11, 2010

Ryan Maddux and Andy Stuckey The Greensburg Daily News Thu Mar 11, 2010, 08:46 AM EST

Tim Burton's latest cinematic endeavor is Alice in Wonderland (PG-13). Inspired by Lewis Carroll's classic tales, Burton's Alice centers on a teenage Alice (Mia Wasikowska) that falls down the rabbit hole. Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham Carter, Anne Hathaway and Crispin Glover costar in the film.

Andy: Tim Burton has the distinction of being one of the most acclaimed directors in Hollywood who rarely makes a great movie. I really enjoyed Big Fish, but that was all the way back in 2003. And before that I’d have to go back to 1996’s Mars Attacks to find something truly interesting in his catalogue. Alice in Wonderland continues with the trend of Burton’s underperforming. It’s okay, but there is nothing particularly exciting about this movie.

Ryan: Tim Burton adapting Alice in Wonderland, in theory, seems like a good idea. The fantastical elements of the story would seem to fit the quirky imagination of Burton's cinematic sensibility. For the first twenty or so minutes Burton did a solid job of sitting up the situation of a more adult Alice rebelling against her Victorian environment. But once in Wonderland the movie becomes one giant bore. I realize that calling the movie boring is not cutting edge criticism but the bottom line is that the movie fails to generate any thrills whatsoever.

Andy: Considering the fact that it is taking place in "Wonderland," and things are supposed to be getting curiouser and curiouser, I think I it is fair to call this movie boring. Even in 3D it lacked the edge that you would expect the Tim Burton adaptation of an already surreal piece of literature to be. I’ve claimed in the past that Burton’s movies have started to feel like what someone would expect a Tim Burton movie to be, and there is certainly something stale and lacking that lingers over much of this film.

Ryan: In a lot of ways—through no fault of its own—Alice in Wonderland is a victim of its own historical significance. In the past several years the cinematic landscape has been dominated by fantasy films involving a child (or young adult) who discovers a world within a world and in some capacity ends up saving it. While I respect Burton for wanting to take the movie in a different direction the result bares out that he was unable to produce a film that's any different from the handful of movies that have been released in the past couple of years. Alice in Wonderland should not be presented in a generic fashion but that's what happened.

Andy: The performances were merely adequate for the talent involved. The cast is a who’s who of Hollywood, and they all seem to be doing an uninspired archetype of characters they’ve played in the past. Johnny Depp is pretty good, but it’s nothing we haven’t seen from him before. The relative newcomer in the group, Mia Wasikowska, does a pretty nice job in the title role, and the Cheshire cat was very entertaining. Beyond that, the execution of this movie falls short.

Ryan: The only noteworthy highlight of the film is Mia Wasikowska's performance of Alice. I'll concede that it's not a complete shout-out breakthrough performance but it was definitely strong enough to confidently say that she does have a bright future in Hollywood. In a film with very little personality Wasikowska delivers a performance worthy of the "Alice" character.

Alice in Wonderland fails to live up to expectations, earning a mediocre C.

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