My Review: Alice in Wonderland (1951) (5/10)

¨If I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense. Nothing would be what it is because everything would be what it isn`t.¨

(5/10) Those are the words Alice tells her cat right before following the white rabbit to Wonderland. I can just imagine movie trailers today saying ¨Be careful what you wish for¨ because that is exactly what happens in this 1951 classic Disney movie adapted from Lewis Caroll`s novel of the same name; Alice gets what she wishes for and it isn`t all that fun. This was probably one of my least favorite Disney movies when I was a kid. I remember being as freaked out by all the mad characters in Wonderland as Alice was. I really loved Peter Pan, Snow White, Cinderella, Robin Hood, Pinocchio, but this was not one of the movies I remembered enjoying. My memory was not so great either so I decided to re watch this movie and see how I felt about it now that I am a bit older. The main reason I wanted to see this however is because I am a huge fan of Tim Burton and Johnny Depp and their new version of Alice is coming out this weekend with Depp playing the Mad Hatter so I wanted to be more familiar with the story. I really didn`t like this film, but I am still excited about Burton recreating this world. Alice in Wonderland directors Clyde Geronime, Wilfred Jackson, and Hamilton Luske had already worked together in Cinderella, and they continued to do so with Peter Pan, and Lady and the Tramp. Out of these four Disney movies this is the one I enjoyed the least, but it is by far the most imaginative one and Burton will surely do something great with this fascinating world.

Alice is voiced by Kathryn Beaumont (who later voiced Wendy in Peter Pan) and she is a very imaginative girl who doesn`t want to listen to stories from a book because they are just words without pictures. She wishes she could live in a world where everything is different and animals can speak like humans. Right after she says these things a white hare (voiced by Jerry Colinna) with a clock runs past her and her kitten saying that he is late. When Alice hears him speak, she decides to follow him and ends up falling through a hole in the ground. Here she enters a room with a speaking doorknob, the hare has already passed the door but she is locked in. The doorknob tells her to drink a liquid from a bottle that makes her smaller so she can fit through the door, but once she does so Alice doesn´t have the key to get through so she has to take a bite from a cookie in order to be big again and reach the key. The problem is that she becomes a giant and begins to cry so much that the room begins to flood. Everything is solved when she drinks the liquid, shrinks again and finally is able to get through the door and enter Wonderland. The movie continues to get weirder and weirder as Alice searches for the hare while meeting all these strange characters such as a Cheshire cat (Sterling Holloway) that can disappear, a Mad Hatter (Ed Wynn) that is constantly drinking tea and celebrating his unbirthday, a Caterpillar (Richard Haydn) that is getting high before transforming into a butterfly, and an evil Queen of Hearts (Verna Felton) with an army of cards that seems to control Wonderland and is some sort of a tyrant. Once Alice is in this world, she wants to find her way back home because she realizes that everyone is crazy in that place and that nothing makes sense, and that is exactly how I felt.

Disney has made a lot of successful films, but this movie is way too imaginative and lacks a better story. I really felt bored throughout the movie and I was hoping it would end even before Alice made it to Wonderland. This does not lower my expectations however with Burton´s film and I am glad I saw this again because now I am familiar with some of the characters that will be in the film. Burton is a specialist with fantasy and he can perhaps create a better story using some of these whacky characters. The main problem I had with the cartoon is that there was no plot whatsoever. It felt like it was missing something. I don`t think I will be seeing this again. Even Alice was sorry for wanting to create a world like this and I ended up agreeing with her when she said ¨It would be so nice if something would make sense for a change.¨ That is exactly what I thought at the end of this movie. Many people enjoyed this film so I guess it is just me. I don`t have too much imagination.