Filmmaker Tim Burton is in production on a film based on Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass.
Burton, director of Batman, Edward Scissorhands, Beetlejuice, Sleepy Hollow, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and other successful fantasy films, is using digital manipulation of real-life actors and actresses to recreate the inhabitants of Wonderland, such as the Mad Hatter (Burton regular Johnny Depp), the Red Queen (Helena Bohnam-Carter), the Cheshire Cat (Stephen Fry), the Jabberwock (Christopher Lee, a superb choice), and Tweedledum and Tweedledee (both played by Matt Lucas (Little Britain).
The film has Alice (Mia Wasikowska, Defiance) returning to Wonderland as a teenager.
Given that Burton said he chose Wasikowska because she has a "certain kind of emotional toughness," and putting that together with the director’s track record and the use of a significantly older protagonist than in the books, it’s likely that this new version of the story will be much darker, disturbing, and grotesque (as opposed to Carroll’s charming use of the bizarre) than Carroll’s books and the various film and theatrical versions.
Judging by Burton’s previous work, the film is also likely to be interesting, inventive, cinematically smart, visually arresting, emotionally affecting, and quite difficult to make much ultimate sense of.
Photos of of some of the characters in the film are available in a Yahoo! article.
Very good thought, Lars. Unfortunately, it seems unlikely that this is what Burton will be going for.
The whole idea of Alice going back to Wonderland as a teen intrigues me (as an idea; I expect I’ll give the movie a miss). Isn’t that kind of what modern life is about? Extending childhood as long as possible; trying to live irresponsibly as long as we can, while still taking advantage of the greater freedom and power nature gives us? Thus does ALICE IN WONDERLAND become a horror story.
Thanks for the comment, Fred.
I think you’re right to suspect that Burton’s version will be rather harrowing. Whether that will be something enjoyable is the big question. I imagine that the level of enjoyability is going to come down in great part to a matter of taste.
But the ultimate value of the film will depend on the spirit behind it, if you will. Like you, I would greatly prefer for it to “ground the darkness in a sense of wonder and some kind of moral underpinning,” as you aptly put it. That, unfortunately, has not been Burton’s strong point.
I’m definitely cautious about this. It may be great but Burton’s obvious desire to reset the story raises some red flags. I have a feeling I’d be happier if it were Terry Gilliam; he’s a bit better at grounding the darkness in a sense of wonder and some kind of moral underpinning (whether or not I agree with it all the time or not).