But I will tell you a secret:
None of the best people are!
I picked up on that but was not nearly as bothered as some people are. After all, the opium trade implications explained quite a lot about Alice, her father and her general take on life and why her trip(s) to Wonderland- which I refuse to call Underland ;)- were perfectly logical and believable.
WTF was that Underland crap. Seriously, what was the point of that?
Eh, I liked it enough. Johnny Depp’s psycho Scots accent was interesting, and the March Hare made me laugh. But the ending was ridiculous.
I felt like Burton didn’t really bother to understand the books. The movie wasn’t nonsensical enough to me. Everyone was nuts but in a psychotic way rather than a silly way.
That’s just the literature student in me though. I enjoyed the movie, though I wasn’t greatly impressed.
i agree. wonderland was supposed to be whimsical and childishly illogical. burton turned it into a 3d imitation of Narnia and all the feudal strife that goes along with it.
I enjoyed it enough. The 3D was better than A Christmas Carol and the movie was fun. I didn’t read the source all the way through and so was not tied to much in the way of previous opinion.
I hated the ending, starting from the ridiculous dancing scene right up to Alice sailing away on the boat. I think that’s where the story most missed the mark… the books weren’t about bucking conformity, they were about the absurdity of life through the eyes of a child. Alice didn’t wake up at the end of Wonderland and tell her Latin teacher to shove off or anything. It’s not acceptable for good little Victorian girls to do that. Carroll never once suggested that it was. He was just reflecting a child’s reality and lamenting, in the most tender and nostalgic way, the loss of innocence that nobody, not even Alice, is immune to.
So yeah, the movie’s vision of Alice triumphing over society’s expectations of her, not at all in line with the book or with the values of Victorian England. Totally implausible.
Though I confess I love, LOVE the fact that she didn’t meet a cute boy or something on the ship. For once a female protagonist’s life vision did not involve marrying someone who loved her for who she really is. It involved exploration and a successful career. And I love that. You don’t realize how rare that is until you see it in a film like this one.
Overall, though, for what it was, the movie was pretty good. Not brilliant, but nothing to be ashamed of, really. Except the dance. Shame of the dance is definitely appropriate.
I’ve said it before and I’ll keep saying it until he stops working: Tim Burton is a hack. He is void of original ideas. His only idea is to take something that people love from their childhood and “goth it up”. Fuck him. Stop paying to see his movies.
I mean, did y’all not see how he fucked up Planet Of The Apes? Did you miss how he botched Charlie & The Chocolate Factory? Did it escape your notice that he fucked up Irving Washington’s story with his Sleepy Hollow?
Every film he makes is an excuse for him to goth some shit up and provide a paycheck for his talentless wife. And Depp isn’t nearly as talented an actor as many people make him out to be (that’s right; I said it).
It’s fair enough to not like him, but I don’t think he is void of originality - what about Edward Scissorhands or Big Fish or The Nightmare Before Christmas? I haven’t seen Planet of the Apes, but I loved what he did with Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and I liked Sleepy Hollow too.
Good luck getting people to ‘stop paying to see his movies’ - there is obviously a reason he does well at the box office. I personally would pay to see pretty much anything with his name on it, just for the crazy dark visuals and the over the top stylized atmosphere. Actually, Big Fish is one of my favorite movies of all time.
I can accept that his work is a taste that does not appeal to all, but I don’t think it’s fair to say he is a hack or a fuck up.
Big Fish, Edward Scissorhands, and The Nightmare Before Christmas are indeed all great. To say nothing of Beetlejuice. But I hated Planet of the Apes and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. He seems to do very well with new ideas but adapting an existing work definitely brings out the hack in him. And I’ve come to hate Johnny Depp ever since Pirates of the Caribbean, the most overrated movie of the past fifty years.
Sigh. Yes, yes I did. I even own a copy on DVD because it came as part of the ape-head PotA set.
No, I didn’t miss that one.
I did skip this one. Partly because I’m not really aware of the base story, partly because the concept didn’t interest me.
I’m not saying that going to see this one was a good idea, especially as Burton hasn’t made a watchable movie since the remake of Batman. I’m just trying to tell others not to make the same mistake.
I remember seeing in interviews he did for Planet of the Apes that he wasn’t interested in reading the book, and didn’t even watch the movie very closely. He had his own idea. An idea that, it turns out, made absolutely no sense at all and was poorly written and directed.
I keep seeing his remakes out of a misplaced loyalty to the original. I know that I should stop this, but I don’t seem to be able to.
And I’ve only just realised how much I sound like a rape victim defending their attacker. Well I’m not the victim here! MY CHILDHOOD is the victim here! Won’t somebody think of my childhood?
Dude, I quoted you up there because you’re one of the people who has it right; not sure why you keep paying him to piss all over your (our) childhood. There may be a 12 step program or something that could help you tho. 
Gothing shit up ≠ originality
Edward Scissorhands? You mean that take on Frankenstein that he gothed up? FFS, he’s doing it again, this time by “re-imagining” his own fucking movie. Seriously, he’s so void of ideas that he’s remaking his own 1984 short film, Frankenweenie.
Big Fish I haven’t seen, but I understand it may not be all that goth-y. None of my friends owns a copy, and since I won’t pay this imbecile for his product, I haven’t seen it.
Nightmare Before Christmas wasn’t his movie; he came up with the gothy story and characters and then he produced it. It was directed by his gothy friend, Henry Selick (who later gave us the pointlessly goth Coraline). And he didn’t write it either- the screenplay was written by Michael McDowell, who also wrote Beetlejuice.
Goth goth goth: it’s the only schtick Mr. Burton has. Unless pissing all over established intellectual properties and people’s fond childhood memories counts as a modus operandi.
For the record, Beetlejuice sucked, his Batman wasn’t as good as the TV series, and his wife’s acting is so bad she can’t get a role unless it calls for a crappy goth performance (which is apparently what Mr. Burton always needs).
Oh yeah, and Danny Elfman hasn’t written anything worth hearing since the early '80’s except for the Simpsons theme song.
IMO. YMMV. BYBW.
Hey, just cause you didn’t think of it first…!
I didn’t realize it was a Disney movie until the opening credits; I put all expectations on hold after that.
Actually, I prefer to come up with my own IPs and if I’m gonna piss all over something, I prefer to defile everybody’s misplaced current affections. Been doing it since the 1980s. And judging by our culture, I’ll never lack for material.
(I warned people not to listen to a-Ha and 'Til Tuesday back in the day, and I was right: that shit sucks to listen to as “oldies” even more than it sucked when it was new. And please, slap my eardrums if I ever have to listen to Mr. Mister ever again. Do you realize that some day that shitty Rhianna “ummmmmber ella” song will be an oldie? <shudder>)
But I’ve said my piece (and then some) about Mr. Burton here. I’ll bow out so those who’ve actually lost 108 minutes of their lives can talk about the movie at hand.
c ya
You ‘warned them’? What was going to happen to them? I’m unclear as to why it is so dire if I watch movies I enjoy - yes, Tim Burton has a style that he sticks to. I happen to enjoy it. So what?
Obviously, based on what happened in his examples, is that decades later you’ll have to read internet postings about how he still hates them. And remember, so far both of his warnings have come true! :eek:
I for one thought that the movie was kinda nice. I guess I don’t have as high standards as the rest of you…
Maybe, maybe not. “Kinda nice” isn’t too far from several reviews of it here. What did you like and not like about it?
Um. Uh. See, problem with asking that question is that I’m not a very critical movie-goer. I’m easily satisfied. Eye candy but a half-arsed plot? Fine with me. Awesome plot but bad effects? Fine with me. Alice was pretty decent in both respects (I don’t remember the original Alice in Wonderland/Through the Looking-Glass plots, so I can’t compare for faithfulness).
Basically, I can’t tell you the specifics.
Oh god. Okay, I’m not going to pay for this film. And, like Antinor1, I reckon this will dash any hopes for American McGee’s Alice, which is sad because at least McGee’s Alice bought something to the table other than big names and big budgets.