Tag Archives: Alice in Wonderland

Destination Disneyworld

My Brother arrives today, as he got the weekend off from his supersecret project to create human-dinosaur hybrid supersoldiers. We’re going to see Alice tonight.

I think we’re supposed to get in the spirit of things and say, “Walt Disney Picture’s Alice in Wonderland, a Disney Digital Production by director Tim Burton.” I’m not awake enough for that level of corporate perkiness. I’m just going to say, “Alice” and growl at anyone who suggests I’m not being sufficiently perky. Nowhere on the passes does it state we have to be perky.

Disney is the happiest place on earth and all, so we’ll hit happy hour before the movie, of course. That’s what they mean, right? We can follow directions when we want to.

I’m excited to see the movie. I’m also excited because I don’t think anyone will be telling me I look like Helena Bonham Carter this time.

helena-bonham-carter-in-alice-in-wonderland_vanity-fair-744188

If they do, I have other things to worry about.

Alice in Wonderland (1999)

When you stop being disturbed by the image of grown men dressed as rabbits, that’s when I think you have a real problem.

Fortunately, the 1999 NBC miniseries, Alice in Wonderland, features a white rabbit and other creatures created by Jim Henson’s Creature Shop. Unfortunately, it also features Whoopi Goldberg as the Cheshire Cat. Everything about the Cheshire Cat is wrong. Only a small part of that blame can be laid at Whoopi’s feet, but she’s still a terrible choice.

It’s an amusing enough adaptation but it’s got more than a whiff of those awkward 80s made for tv production values about it, which is unfortunate because it was made in 1999. There’s more good than bad and the Emmy Awards it won included makeup and costumes (and the nomination for visual effects) that were certainly deserved.

It does contain one of my favorite version of the caucus race, but I may be partial to it because it takes place in a surreal library and the participants of the race remind me fondly of some of my more eccentric library colleagues. It’s a remarkably faithful version of Alice in Wonderland/Through the Looking Glass and I’m going to have nightmares about that March Hare.

This version stars Tina Majorino (Alice), Robbie Coltrane, Whoopi Goldberg (Cheshire Cat), Ben Kingsley (the Caterpillar), Christopher Lloyd, Pete Postlethwaite, Miranda Richardson, Martin Short (the Mad Hatter), Peter Ustinov, George Wendt and Gene Wilder.

The DVD we’re watching was released today with 5 minutes restored to it that were apparently cut in the previous release. We can’t judge whether this is an improvement or not because we’ve never seen it before. I can say that the March Hare’s teapot/pipe organ is exceptionally clever. You can see it at about 1:36 in this youtube clip, which has the embedding feature blocked so I can only link to it.

Alice in Wonderland (1903)

The DVD release of the 2009 documentary Alice: A Look into Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland has both the 1903 and 1915 adaptations of Alice on it as special features. The 1903 version was recently restored as much as possible by the British Film Institute and they’ve made it available online on the BFI website.

“Alice in Wonderland consists of a number of loosely connected scenes from the novel. The audience was assumed to be familiar with not only the book but also Tenniel’s famous illustrations. As far as we can establish from Hepworth’s catalogue, the most significant scene that’s missing is one in which Alice meets a giant puppy in the garden – this was offered separately, but no copies appear to survive.”

It’s worth a watch, it’s got some rather sophisticated visual effects for a film of it’s time, I believe.