Running Into the Wonderwall

Alice in Wonderland Starring: Mia Wasikowska, Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham Carter, Anne Hathaway, Michael Sheen, Crispin Glover. Directed by: Tim Burton. Written by: Linda Woolverton.

On paper, Tim Burton’s latest film, “Alice in Wonderland,” based on two of Lewis Caroll’s “Alice” stories, should be a slam dunk. The world of Wonderland is just dark and twisty enough to satisfy Burton and his design team’s often macabre sensibilities, the film’s co-stars include two frequent collaborators, Helena Bonham Carter (Burton’s girlfriend) and the indispensible Johnny Depp (his seventh collaboration with Burton) , who add their certain pizzazz to the juicy, odd characters roles, and with the new 3-D technology the film should literally pops off the screen with a whole new life. But unlike in previous Burton efforts such as “Edward Scissorhands,” “Sleepy Hollow, or “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory,” the director is not able to elevate these elements beyond their level best; creating a film that’s expected instead of exceptional.

The film, in an unexpected plot twist, focuses on the now 20-year-old Alice (newcomer Mia Wasikowska) as she tries to fit into a world of Victorian England, where young ladies are expected to be demure and pretty, instead of curious and adventurous. So when she runs away from a high society garden party and a sniveling young man who fancies her, she once again finds herself chasing a white rabbit in a waistcoat and falling head first down a rabbit hole.

When she arrives in a land we eventually know to be properly pronounced Underland, we see the familiar cast of creatures and characters (including the Caterpillar, the White Rabbit, and the Mad Hatter played by Johnny Depp) we’ve known from past incarnations of the story. They keep insisting she’s been there before, and she keeps pleading with them that she must be dreaming, and that they have the wrong Alice. But as the film progresses though, the young heroine realizes she truly is the right Alice, and it is her destiny to destroy the dragon of the Red Queen and bring peace to the world.

Now that may sound a bit confusing, and don’t worry, that’s actually a simplified version of the plot. Burton and his crew have created a film much like Alice’s ever changing height. There are some moments where we want the film to be large and epic, and instead we get quirky and idiosyncratic, in some situations, like the trainwreck of an ending, the story gets too big for its own good. Instead of using a simple story and letting the intensity of the visuals speak for themselves, he bogs us down with even more story, more unnecessary characters, more confusion than “Alice in Wonderland” needs.

Johnny Depp’s Mad Hatter is a perfect example. Even in his most outrageous and outlandish characters, Depp usually straddles the line between insanity and humanity well, but in this film he keeps it too much in the crazy realm. He’s dialed it up to 20 when the story only really calls for about an 8. Similarly Helena Bonham Carter’s Red Queen is so outrageous, so over-the-top, that even in a world of madness and unreality, she seems almost too mad, to unreal to be believable. That being said, Wasikowska is a breath of fresh air as Alice. Strong and sensitive, emotional yet reserved, this young lady, with her porcelain skin rises above a screenplay and a movie that can’t contain her.

Along with Wasikowska though, Burton’s creative team brings their usual A-game to their parts throughout. Robert Stromberg, who just won an Oscar for the art direction on “Avatar,” has helped combine the 3-D technology with highly-stylized (and still mighty ugly-looking) of Burton’s other films to Underland with ornate castles, grand gardens, and elaborately decorated rooms the story calls for. In the same vein, Colleen Atwood in her eighth collaboration with Burton has fashioned more of the meticulous, Victorian-inflected, corseted waist, full skirt costumes we learned to expect from her.

But at the end of the day, most will agree that sets and costumes are the standout of every film by Tim Burton. We’re always impressed by what aesthetics he presents, but what almost always seems to be missing is the heart. He’s always been a style over substance director, and in this film it becomes increasingly frustrating because we see what potential is just underneath the surface of the palely, painted faces, and over-the-top performances. Just as we’ve seen in so many other incarnations of this story, “Alice in Wonderland” is not always what it seems on the surface. Grade: D