Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland (2010)

I think this will be very interesting but if Helena Bonham-Carter is in it I’m done, I’m out. Sick and tired of that predictable crap. Johnny Depp needs to move on as well, enough with the quirky emo roles. Pirates worked out ok, stick with that.

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland simply doesn’t translate to the screen, in spite of many attempts to do so. It only works as a reading experience.

Tim Burton, by his own admission, doesn’t know a good script from a bad one. He obviously also doesn’t know a good score, since he keeps using Danny Elfman.

In my opinion, we do need another. And another, and another. Until we get an adaptation that’s original and flawless and true to the books.

(I’m a HUGE Alice fan. If I had to pick one favorite book, it would be Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. I read the books at least once a year and enjoy them more every single time.)

I am so excited about this movie I can hardly stand myself. The only valuable adaptation of the books I’ve seen was the Disney version, but obviously it lacked the dark, cynical wisdom of the books and was geared totally toward children.

I think Patrick Stewart should be in this movie somehow. He would make a good King of Hearts, and the dignity in his voice would lend a beautiful ironic twist to the bumbling idiocy of the king.

Or–OR — he could be the cherished White Knight of Through the Looking Glass. Depends on how far Burton intends to take the story.

I don’t know about that. I saw a very interesting TV miniseries version (I want to say it was done by the BBC but I could be wrong) that paired both Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass into one story. It kept to the spirit of Carroll rather than the literal text which I found effective.

Thinking about her possible scene in the final Harry Potter movie (you KNOW what scene I mean … it completely makes the book), I can easily see Julie Walters as the Red Queen. It might even be a hoot to see Mark Williams (who played Arthur Weasley) as the King of Hearts.

And even though it’s not in the first book, I could totally see Phillip Seymour Hoffman doing a dual role as Tweedledum and Tweedledee.

She does not strike me as very Alice-like but maybe I am wrong. A radical departure would be to cast and actual child of the correct age. Alice was how old in the book? Around 10 I think. In this case the actress would be an unknown.

She lives with Burton, I see little chance she won’t be in it.

I always liked the Disney version, though like all Disney movies it took huge liberties with the source material. Tim Burton has done some great movies like Big Fish & Edward Scissorhands and some I don’t like, “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory”.

I cannot believe you are not liking the creator of the Simpsons Theme. What is wrong with Danny Elfman?

How about Emma Watson as Alice?

To infinity and beyond…

The original Alice in Wonderland is a very dark book, and I can see Burton doing a good job with it.

She’ll still be filming the final HP movies. She might even take a little time off when these are finally done.

OlivesMarch4th, you love the annotated versions by Martin Gardner?

I can’t speak for Olive, but I love the Annotated Alice*. I don’t own a copy, unfortunately, but I generally borrow it from the library around once a year to reread.

If I had to guess, it’d be ADHD. He does decent work with pieces of a minute or so in length. Beyond that lies crap.

Burton was also supposed to have done Believe it or Not, about Robert Ripley, but the production costs got too high. Unfortunate, because it sounded interesting to me.

And the production costs of *Alice in Wonderland * aren’t going to be too high? Let me guess . . . a *real * talking dormouse.

I wanna see Hugh Laurie as the Mock Turtle. “Sooooup of the Evening, Beautiful Sooooup!”
And special appearance by the Geico Gecko as Bill the Lizard.

I kind of want to see Hugh Laurie as EVERY role.

Maybe he and Stephen Fry can team up to do a Mad Hatter/March Hare thing.

That is an interesting conjecture…will this live-action Alice turn into the celebrity cameofest that just about every live-action Alice does?

Gary Cooper made a fine White Knight in 1933. I see . . . Clint Eastwood!

I wouldn’t touch this thing. I’m another who’s sick to death of Burton. He always makes the same damned movie with the same damned gray-ass palette. I can scarcely make out the difference between “Batman,” “Corpse Bride,” “Sleepy Hollow,” and “Sweeney Todd.” The guy just steamrollers the material with his overbearing technique. Having this one-note mediocrity in control of one of the wittiest, most intelligent works in the English language is off-putting in the extreme.

Most versions of Alice combine it with its sequel, Through the Looking-Glass, so let’s also cast:

Red King
Red Queen
Red Knight
White Knight
Tweedledum and Tweedledee
Humpty Dumpty
The Walrus and the Carpenter
The Lion and the Unicorn

The Walrus and the Carpenter are in the first book. They’re the main characters in the poem that the Mock Turtle recites for Alice.