Alice in Wonderland

Alice is back in Wonderland, but its inhabitants aren’t sure she is the right Alice. She looks the same but doesn’t act at all like what they remember their Alice to be. As the Mad Hatter proclaims, old Alice was “much more muchier.” The same can be said for Time Burton’s “Alice in Wonderland.” Past incarnations of the fabled Lewis Carroll story and Burton’s previous work are definitely “muchier.” The film has a hard time finding its own identity, though it’s not without redeeming qualities.

The 1951 Disney animated “Alice in Wonderland” that most people are familiar with was a simple story of a girl’s jaunt through Wonderland as she looks for a way home. This revamped Alice is dealing with things far heavier and the new look of Underland (Alice got the name wrong as a youngster) is fittingly murky and gothic.

Alice (Mia Wasikowska) is 19 years old, on the cusp of a new decade in her life and faced with a marriage proposal to an upper class twit of the year. She's been having dreams of blue caterpillars and talking animals that her late father reassured her made her crazy, "though all the best people are." Not quite ready to let go of her childhood dreams of impossibilities, Alice falls back down the rabbit hole. Underland has been waiting for her return as Alice is destined to slay the Jabborwocky, the henchman of the villainous Red Queen (Helena Bonham Carter), to return the White Queen to power.

Alice is a whimsical young woman who rejects early marriage and winds up in Joan of Arc-like armor wielding a sword against the feared Jabborwocky. She’s a warrior-heroine who is not relegated to a sex-symbol, doesn’t chase after a man’s affection and is more likely to wear a corset and stockings (fat chance) than be a damsel in distress. In addition to this refreshingly strong-minded female lead, Underland’s problems are set in motion by powerful feuding sisters not fighting over a man but for their own self-worth or humanistic beliefs. As it is so rare in Hollywood to find more than one interesting female role per film, “Alice” deserves praise for this alone. Unfortunately, the rest of the film doesn’t come together as impressively.

Burton’s speckles his film with moments of his trademark quirky flavor, such as when a fat pig comes squealing to the Red Queen’s throne to be her foot rest, but overall, his style got lost in an over-burdened story, forced wackiness and pointless 3D effects. The promise of revolutionary 3D that followed Avatar is not at all realized in “Alice,” where the 3D is unsurprisingly cumbersome and labored as Burton shot the film for 2D.

The story relies on the fact that audiences are familiar with the characters so it doesn’t bother to establish them, but then takes them into entirely new territories. The Cheshire Cat, Blue Caterpillar and White Rabbit are all there but can’t decide if they are recreations or reinterpretations. Maybe the film asked directions from Tweedledee and Tweedledum, because the story goes in every which way, but nowhere at all.

The Mad Hatter and the Red Queen, handled expertly by Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter respectively, stand above the rest. Depp's jitteriness and frighteningly glazed expression has hints of the animated Hatter but is a unique creation of Burton’s interpretation and a great example of how to make the old come alive. The only complaint would be that the Mad Hatter was forced into being a bigger role than needed. Layered in make-up and a clown wig, Depp makes you long for the “Ed Wood” and “Edward Scissorhands” days when his collaboration with Burton felt so effortless.

Bonham Carter's cold portrayal of the Red Queen with a head almost as large as her delusions of dignity brings an unexpected depth to an over-the-top villain. Credit must also be given for Anne Hathaway’s kooky turn as the docile yet off-beat White Queen. Though not as present as her evil sister, the White Queen feels like a true Burton inspiration.

If only the rest of the film followed the pattern of these three characters in taking familiarity and subverting it. Instead, “Alice in Wonderland” is an underwhelming display of Burton’s old “muchness.”