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Like many of the kids who first pored over Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass, critics have found both delight and displeasure in Tim Burton's visualization of those books in Disney's newest Alice in Wonderland. In the late 60s, Disney's 1951 animated version sometimes appeared on the walls of Ken Kesey's "Acid Tests" accompanied by psychedelic rock music, and there was much speculation that the film's animators must have been high on LSD when they created it. However, Lou Lumenick in the New York Post, writing about the new Alice, comments, "It seems unlikely hipsters will be lighting up to this all-too-earnest tale of female empowerment in the Victorian era." Nevertheless, in what is otherwise a negative review, Lumenick concludes, "Burton, one of the great visual artists in Hollywood history, is incapable of making an uninteresting movie." And several other critics agree that the images Burton creates for this Alice are the best thing about it. In the Chicago Sun-Times, Roger Ebert comments, "Alice plays better as an adult hallucination, which is how Burton rather brilliantly interprets it until a pointless third act flies off the rails. ,,, Burton is above all a brilliant visual artist, and his film is a pleasure to regard." (Ebert, who has complained that 3D glasses dim the screen, then adds: "I look forward to admiring it in 2D, where it will look brighter and more colorful. No artist who can create these images is enhancing them in any way by adding the annoying third dimension." J. Hoberman in the Village Voice agrees, noting that the 3D imaging was added in post production and seems "shallow and largely superfluous.") Michael Phillips in the Chicago Tribune writes that "its best and strangest interludes assert Burton's skills as a fantasist" and suggests that the film is "best approached as corporate undertaking, undertaken successfully." That's the way Kenneth Turan in the Los Angeles Times approaches it, too, but he writes that it would be nicer if it "felt less like corporate moves and more like situations that came from the heart." Turan finds little enchantment in the film. "It has its successful moments," he concedes, "but it's surprisingly inert overall." And a few critics find little at all to admire about the film -- including the visuals, Colin Covert in the Minneapolis Star-Tribune complains: "The film looks as though a dozen production designers competed with one another to see who could achieve the most outrageous folly." »


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