Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland is One of the Most Anticipated Movies of the Year

Avante garde director Tim Burton is known for his gloriously strange movies.  Many of his past efforts are bona fide cult classics like The Nightmare Before Christmas, Beetlejuice,  and Ed Wood.  Other movies done by Burton have had a lot of mainstream success like the Batman installations he directed and Sleepy Hollow, his brilliantly dark and brooding version of the story of the Headless Horseman.  His vision is sometimes funny, sometimes quirky, but always dark and surprising.  When the news was leaked that Burton was mounting a retelling of the story of Alice in Wonderland fans started drooling with anticipation to see what kind of world Tim Burton would bring to life through the looking glass.

Just like he usually does he cast Johnny Depp, who has been in nearly every Tim Burton movie through the years, in one of the prime roles as the Mad Hatter.  He cast his longtime partner and talented actress Helena Bonham Carter as the Red Queen. Newcomer Mia Wasikowska plays a more grown up Alice with white skin, pale blonde hair, and a distinctly dark air that is nothing like the little girl Alice in the original story.  The heavy use of CGI effects adds to the weird and wonderful mood that Burton creates in Wonderland and also helps him bring some of Lewis Carroll’s most colorful characters to life.

Tim Burton’s version of the Alice in Wonderland story isn’t just a recreation of the classic Lewis Carroll story. In typical Tim Burton fashion he has taken the story and added his own twist to it.  In this Alice in Wonderland film Alice is older, and has already been through the looking glass, although she doesn’t remember. When she is running away from a potential suitor that her parents want her to marry she falls down the rabbit hole into a world that is familiar but strange to her.  Burton’s Alice in Wonderland acknowledges the first story and is built on the idea that the characters in Wonderland are all familiar to Alice but it’s a separate and distinct storyline from the original.

When the teaser trailer and production stills from Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland were released fans gasped.  Johnny Depp, in full makeup and costume as the Mad Hatter, was unrecognizable. With fiery, wild hair and bold theatrical makeup the photos are barely human. The released photos of the Wonderland landscape as portrayed in the film show a true wonderland that could only have come from Burton’s imagination. Wonderland in this film is a perfect blend of familiar and unfamiliar, dark and light, but slightly menacing too.  The cinematography is typical of Tim Burton and anyone who knows Burton’s work would be able to pick it out as his film instantly.

Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland is scheduled for release in 2010, and already audiences are clamoring to see it.  Recently at Comic-Con fans slept overnight in front of the room where Burton and cast members were slated to speak about the film and show new footage from the film just so that they would have a chance to get into the room to see Burton.  When Johnny Depp showed up unexpectedly to join the panel fans were overjoyed.  On the Net and off fans can’t wait for Burton’s Alice in Wonderland to be released.

Alice In Wonderland Costumes