Alice in Wonderland

Directed by Tim Burton

(PG)

**

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Tim Burton and Johnny Depp should probably “start seeing other people,” said Christopher Rosen in The New York Observer. Their seventh project together, Alice in Wonderland, is a “soul-deadening and laborious” take on Lewis Carroll’s beloved story. The film finds Alice, played here by Australian actress Mia Wasikowska, heading down the rabbit hole once again. This time, though, our heroine is not a schoolgirl but a 19-year-old trying to avoid adulthood. Considering Burton’s love of eccentricity, he’d seem to

be the perfect director to bring Carroll’s fantastical visions to the screen, said Owen Gleiberman in Entertainment Weekly. Yet his 3-D mix of live actors and animation doesn’t “pop with demented life” and instead often seems like a “joyless, bombed-out” nightmare world. Not all the wonder has been lost, said Todd McCarthy in Variety. There are “moments of delight, humor, and bedazzlement” in Depp’s portrayal of the Mad Hatter, and engaging turns by supporting characters, including Stephen Fry as the Cheshire Cat. But too often Alice in Wonderland feels like a “Disney film illustrated by Burton rather than a Burton film that happens to be released by Disney.”