Alice in Wonderland (2010)

Genre

Adventure | Fantasy

Director

Tim Burton

Country

USA

Cast

Mia Wasikowska, Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham Carter, Anne Hathaway, Crispin Glover, Matt Lucas, Frances de la Tour, Leo Bill, Marton Csokas, Lindsay Duncan, Michael Sheen, Alan Rickman, Stephen Fry, Barbara Windsor, Paul Whitehouse, Timothy Spall, Michael Gough, Christopher Lee, Imelda Staunton, Jim Carter, Frank Welker

Storyline

Nineteen-year-old Alice (Mia Wasikowska) returns to the magical world from her childhood adventure, where she reunites with her old friends and learns of her true destiny: to end the Red Queen's (Helena Bonham Carter) reign of terror.

Opinion

I didn't like Alice very much growing up. Having said that, what Tim Burton and Linda Woolverton did here is unforgivable for the simple reason that there is nothing wonderful nor enchanting about his Alice in Wonderland.

The film is visually stunning: everything visual is rich in details, CGI effects are quite well done, costumes and set design are excellent. 

But appearances can be deceiving, and behind all that beauty is hidden the screenplay. An atrociously written, boring, banal screenplay that makes no sense whatsoever. Woolverton just took fantastic source material along with a lot of liberties that do not improve the story in any way, put everything in a box, added clichés, a tedious and predictable plot, bland characters and shaked the all thing. No wonder something did go wrong.

Still, the first person to blame is Tim Burton. He is the main reason I decided to give this film a try, and he is the one that disappointed me the most. The best call is to stop watching it as soon as you find it intolerable so to keep the illusion Burton still is a visionary genius, able to transform beauty in something ectatic, evil in something sublime. The Tim Burton we all know would have made a masterpiece with this material, and yet he did what he did.

Neither the performances can save it. Helena Bonham Carter is slightly overdoing it as the Red Queen, but hers is arguably the best performance in the film. Mia Wasikowska does a fine job as Alice, even though I was expecting something more from her. The voice cast also does a great job, especially Stephen Fry as the Cheshire Cat and Alan Rickman as the Blue Caterpillar, but Johnny Depp is not good at all. He looks like he has just woken up from a hangover, which is basically how he looks in every role he has played recently.

I just wonder how come this film was nominated for Best Musical or Comedy at the 2011 Golden Globes, when all it got is hate. Hate from both critic and public.