“Alice in Wonderland” (2010)

Having Tim Burton film Lewis Carroll’s tale of juvenile surrealism sounds like a match made in movie heaven.  The fact that it comes at a time when the digitised version of 3-D is assuming some serious box office momentum wets the appetite still further.  What could be more enticing than Johnny Depp hamming it up as the Mad Hatter, Helen Bonham-Carter as a disproportionally shortened, bulbous-headed Queen of Hearts, Crispin Glover her twitchy faced security boss, and a variety of talent from the Burton stock company voicing CGI incarnations of well known creatures?

Well, maybe the original story.  Burton’s decision to eschew the tried and true narrative in favour of some kind of vaguely feminist themed sequel which sees Alice as a young adult on the verge of marriage has unfortunate echoes of Spielberg’s wretched attempt to update “Peter Pan” for the 1990s, “Hook”.  Though it is much better than that embarrassment, Burton’s “Alice in Wonderland” seems like a variation on “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe”, or “Lord of the Rings”, with a climax that involves a big set piece battle between the Queen of Hearts’ army of playing cards and those loyal to her pacifist sister (a White Witch who has strayed from Narnia?), and the slaying of a giant monster called the Jabberwocky (one borrowed from another of Carroll’s works).  He thinks he’s making an action adventure - and an over-plotted one at that - whereas the material requires a good deal more charm, subtlety and atmosphere.

As you might expect Burton delivers something that looks the part and there are some droll performances along the way.  Alan Rickman fans should particularly enjoy his dry witted Blue Caterpillar, Stephen Fry has fun with the Cheshire Cat, and the phenomenally ugly “Little Britain” star Matt Lucas scores doubly as Tweedledum and Tweedledee.

Aesthetics and the direction of actors are aspects of the job that Burton seldom struggles with.  Where he usually goes wrong is in the conception and scripting of his projects.  He’s messed with the classics before with disastrous results - how could he ever have thought that remaking “Planet of the Apes” was a good idea? - and “Alice” largely falls into the same category of failed experiment.  It’s nadir comes toward the end when Johnny Depp indulges in a spot of digitally enhanced break dancing.  Could anything be further from the spirit of Lewis Carroll?