Alice is all grown up

Alice in Wonderland isn’t your average tale. Alice is now 19 years old and returning to what she had always thought was a dream.

Director Tim Burton’s gothic touch adds to the maturity change, but doesn’t go overboard to the point of being inappropriate for young children. Any age would be entertained by Burton’s twist on Wonderland.

For those of you who missed out on the childhood tale, Wonderland is full of talking creatures, all a bit “mad.” When Alice first returns to Wonderland, several creatures who greet her upon her arrival are not convinced she is “the real Alice.” However, when she comes upon the Mad Hatter, played by Johnny Depp, he immediately believes in her. Alice has to prove to be a heroine in order to give the good queen, Anne Hathaway, her throne back from her evil sister, the Queen of Hearts, portrayed by Helena Bonham Carter.

Depp says Lewis Carroll, author of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, would be ecstatic because the movie is done with so much respect and rooted within its original material, according to an online interview from wdsfilmpr.com

Burton and Depp have worked together on seven films, Edward Scissorhands being the first and Alice in Wonderland now marking the most recent. From what I've seen, they make a great team; their collaboration films always turn out spectacular.

Although the 3D was a nice effect, it may not have been used as much as it could have been.  There were parts where things really did jump out at you, and that was great, but I was a little disappointed at how rare it was. As a matter of fact, there were several times that I took my 3D glasses off to see if the movie appeared as 2D instead.

I have always loved Burton’s work. He has his own style, and it was definitely obvious in Alice in Wonderland. Although, like Depp said, he stayed within Carroll’s original material, he added his own twist with the slightly gothic touch and the quirky characters, which was very enjoyable. I didn’t feel as if I was watching the movie, I felt like I was there, in Wonderland. Without Burton’s creative imagination and Ken Ralston’s amazing visual effects, this wouldn’t have been possible.

I was extremely content with the film as a whole, but at the end I didn’t want it to be over. Not that I felt like I was left hanging. I just found it to be that good.