Monday 8 March 2010

Alice In Wonderland, Film Review.

I haven't posted a film review here since I tore apart Monsters Inc a while back. But after coming back from watching Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland, I thought I would have my two cents and tell the blogosphere what I thought.

Beware, before you read this. I don't like Tim Burton. Here's why.

This film could have been brilliant, probably as magical as the trailers made out, if it had taken a leaf out of The Wizard Of Oz. The advent of 3D film making could have been made out to be the best thing since colour, which the Wiz took full advantage of by making real life black and white, and Oz colour. I think the initial WOW of Wonderland was dulled down by the opening being in 3D. If the opening in the real world was made 2D, then Wonderland 3D, this could have really brought out that kick that it was desperate for. But the alternate reality Victorian London and Wonderland seemed to mesh into one big 3D congealed universe. I get the feeling that this probably was the vision of Tim Burton, but jumping on the 3D bandwagon meant making the entire film that way. Disney's Influence was useful, being able to reference the old animated film, but Its shafting is a bit too much when the castle reeks of the Disney Cinderella Castle...

And often the case with Tim Burton films, it felt really claustrophobic. If you compare this to Lord of the Rings, Middle Earth felt totally vast and open, like there where places yet undiscovered, and you where dying to just get out and explore. Wonderland just seemed like a set, and there was only one path to follow. And the characters seemed to be just biding their time until Alice got back. With no lives of their own. It just wasn't the expanded universe it could have been.

People walking into Alice in Wonderland thinking that this is the wonderland they had in the original, won't feel that this is the Wonderland that they knew when they where younger. Sure its gone to rack and ruin since the apparent threat of the Red Queen has taken over, but without knowledge of what Tim Burton's new and exciting 3D Wonderland was like before the Helena B Carter took over, its hard to think that this world is in such peril. We have a small flashback into what it was like when se was a young girl, and we are teased with a bright and colourful Wonderland, if only for a few minutes. But it comes too late. It could have probably done with a Lion King style scene where everything goes back to how it was.

It did have its good moments, the final battle felt a bit like a playground scrap, but overall its an enjoyable film. The 3D works for a conversion, and the colours in it are lovely. Just try and leave before the Avril Lavigne number kicks in at the end.

Rant over.

3 comments:

Ollie Bostock said...

i hate reading the word lovely. sounds a bit.... well you no...

ameba graphics said...

I read the word Lovely in a Geordie accent nowadays.

enterfold said...

Mint!