Alice in Wonderland

Alice in Wonderland is a cute, sweet movie that is a Disney classic.  While it was enjoyable to watch I do feel that it is probably one of those movies that is more enjoyable for kids than for adults.  While many of the other Disney movies can easily appeal to both, Alice in Wonderland is very much grounded in the silliness that is most appealing to kids.  Of course, those of us adults that are still very childlike can appreciate it :)

One of the neat things about this movie is that almost all of the voices are recognizable from other Disney films.  Having watched a bunch so far, Jason and I were constantly identifying them throughout the movie.  For instance, Alice is the same voice as Wendy from Peter Pan, the Queen of Hearts is the Fairy Godmother in Cinderella and one of the fairies in Sleeping Beauty, the Cheshire Cat is Kaa in The Jungle Book and Winnie the Pooh, the White Rabbit is Smee from Peter Pan, etc.  There are actually a bunch more, it's pretty cool.

Alice goes through a series of nonsensical adventures which are cute and captivating, but eventually just get frustrating to her.  Sometimes you want to yell at Alice about what the heck she is thinking, but ultimately she learns her lesson... not everything should be complete nonsense, and sometimes we actually want some amount of logic and for things to make sense.

The Music
There are a lot of songs in this movie, but most of them are almost "mini" songs.  They are super short or else just not that interesting.  But with so many mini songs that are so well known, I'm quite surprised that nothing from Alice in Wonderland appears on my set of Disney's Greatest Hits CDs.  You have "The Unbirthday Song," "I'm Late," which are the most memorable, but you also have Alice singing "In a World of My Own," "The Walrus and the Carpenter," and the flowers singing "All in a Golden Afternoon."  Lots of different songs throughout the whole movie - basically every time Alice goes somewhere else or meets someone else, they sing a song.

The Villain
For the majority of the movie Alice does not have a particular villain, just certain obstacles that get in her way.  The biggest villain of all could be seen as the Queen of Hearts, a tyrant who enjoys chopping people's heads off.  She's certainly a frightening figure, and if she was there throughout the movie she could be pretty high up on the villain list.  But she doesn't even get mentioned until the last half hour of the movie.

The Disney World Connection
The infamous "Mad Tea Party" tea cup ride in Fantasyland is themed after the mad tea party in Alice in Wonderland.  There are also plenty of characters walking around, including Alice, the Mad Hatter, the Queen of Hearts, Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum, and others.  They also pop up in a number of the parades and shows.

Becky's rating:  7 out of 10
Jason's rating:  6.5 out of 10