Blu-Ray Review: Alice in Wonderland
Alice in Wonderland: Blu-Ray/DVD/ Digital Combo
This time down the rabbit hole, Alice is 19! We can probably identify much more with a teenaged Alice (played by newcomer Mia Wasikowska) rebelling against a pre-arranged marriage and Tim Burton's visuals are as colorful and "out there" as ever! Also, with the Mad Hatter (Johnny Depp), the White Queen (Anne Hathaway), the Red Queen (Helena Bonham Carter), the White Rabbit (Michael Sheen) and all the amazing beasties, Blu-Ray is the way to go!
Special Features: First off, all the versions of the film look great and even without 3-D, the visuals and audio all hold up with bold colors and clarity and the sound is even better! It wraps around your speaker system with every little noise and rabbit thump coming through as well as music and dialogue. Excellent!
We get almost two hours of extras in two sections: "Wonderland Characters" and "Making Wonderland". Character sections are Finding Alice, The Mad Hatter, The Futterwacken Dance, The Red Queen, Time-Lapse: Sculpting the Red Queen, and The White Queen.
"Wonderland Characters" is cool because each actor gets all excited about the film, working with Burton and developing their characters. Johnny Depp talks again about real hatters being "mad" because of mercury poisoning in their work. These interviews are only a few minutes long but the actors are very cool and all are well worth a watch. You get Helena's make-up and digital "head" coverage and Johnny's Futterwacken Dance to boot.
The "Making Wonderland" section features Scoring Wonderland (music), Effecting Wonderland (the amazing special effects), Stunts of Wonderland, Making the Proper Size, Cakes of Wonderland, and Tea Party Props. You see Mia riding weird green screen "animals", characters on stilts, wire work and learn how Alice changed sizes. The Cakes section features some pretty happy bakers who created the amazing tea party cakes. All a lot of fun to watch.
You don't get a movie-wide commentary from Burton or any of the actors (maybe in a future release?) but you get the digital copy for your portable device or computer and on the DVD you at least get Mad Hatter, Finding Alice and Effecting Wonderland so something for everyone but the Blu-Ray combo pack is the best and most complete buy!
Wrapping Up: Some critics have said this isn't a typical Tim Burton film but it seemed pretty quirky to me. Johnny is strange but wonderful in it as are the other actors, all playing slightly "off" characters. Mia represent the audience very well as a stranger (well, a second-time visitor) in this strange land and the costumes, visuals; the colors and music will just blow you away.
This is a must for Johnny fans of course but, overall, certainly worth adding to your Blu-Ray/DVD collection...if only to learn to do the Futterwacken Dance!
