Alice In Wonderland Masterpiece Edition

Filed Under: Film, Reviews | Article Tags : DVD review

By: The Dweeb

February 2004

DVD Features

Video: Fullscreen 1.33.1 Audio: Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround, Dolby Digital 2.0, French Dolby Digital 2.0 Spanish Dolby Digital 2.0

Newly Discovered Cheshire Cat Song “I’m Odd”
Virtual Wonderland Party
Adventures in Wonderland Set-Top Game
“The Unbirthday Song” And “All in The Golden Afternoon” Sing Along Songs
Original Mickey Mouse Animated Short Thru the Mirror

Theatrical release:7/26/1951
DVD released on 1/27/2004 by Disney/Buena Vista
Running time of 75 minutes
Starring: Kathryn Beaumont
Director: Clyde Geronimi, Wilfred Jackson

Plot: On a golden afternoon, young Alice follows a White Rabbit, who disappears down a nearby rabbit hole. Quickly following him, she tumbles into the burrow – and enters the merry, topsy-turvy world of Wonderland! Memorable songs and whimsical escapades highlight Alice’s journey, which culminates in a madcap encounter with the Queen of Hearts – and her army of playing cards!

Disney decided to dig far back into the vault again and release this classic animated film once more in another edition. Out with the gold edition and in with the platinum they said. Well, it’s essentially the same package with a few new items thrown in for good measure. I don’t expect this to be on the market very long either, as with Disney policy, this one could end up back in the vault before you know it. As the Queen would say, “Off with his head!”

My my what a crazy story teller that Lewis Carrol was, what a difficult task it must have been to come up with the visualizations for all these crazy stories. Disney seems to have pulled it off quite successfully. This was produced when Disney was in its heyday, when it was the top animation studio in all the land. Cranking out classic after classic, Peter Pan, Snow White, Dumbo, everyone knows these movies. Alice in Wonderland sits right up there near the top. In recent years Disney has lost its luster, farming out its hits to that upstart Pixar firm. I don’t think today’s more recent animated fare can even come close to reaching the same levels as the good old stuff. Walt just set the bar too high I guess.

Alice in Wonderland is a fun movie to watch, with all that crazy stuff going on. What kind of drugs was Carrol on anyway? The movie gets going quickly, and soon Alice finds herself meeting all kinds of goofy characters. My favorite would have to Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum, man those two are nuttier than the Mad Hatter. Sometimes there’s so much going on it was hard to keep up with what they were saying at certain points, especially the Tea Party.
Its a fairly short movie, which in this case is good. It is after all supposed to be a children’s film. To entice the would be buyer they decided to add an extra disc that just chock full of all kinds of fun things to do. The transfer to DVD for this film is excellent, the sound is good and the picture is bright and crisp. Not bad for animated fare from the 1950’s. There is an animated Mickey Mouse short included that borrows from the story, and some amusing video clips from yesteryear all related to this movie. These are on the disc with the movie on it.
On the other disc is most of the new stuff that was created for the DVD. Its mostly games geared toward the younger viewer. I thought the Virtual Wonderland Party was a bit cheesy, but hey what do I know? It’s for the kids and not for me so I will shut up now. I do like all the documentary items on the how the film was created, and the various issues they had with the song selection. Overall, I would say this disc will be a permanent fixture on my DVD shelf, its an excellent package. This film will make for some great family entertainment for years to come, its a timeless classic.