Review of Alice in Wonderland (1951) by Rainer K — 14 Nov 2011

After Burton's take on Lewis Carroll's classic novel I now visited the next adaptation of the king of surrealist fairy tales - the Disney classic version and I must say I liked Burton's version better - both the visuals and the storytelling.

The film achieves to be one of the few films/musicals where it's plausible when someone starts singing - way too much of it anyways. I've also seen better animation even though the characters and the extraordinary setting and concept of the Wonderland make up for it - there's some lost potential though (especially if you consider how great Fantasia looked a decade before - a more dream-like approach should have been the better choice for the Alice subject).

Summarized, beyond my expectations, both for an Alice adaptation and a classic Disney, but it will keep you entertained for the 70 minutes it's running.

PS: Now there's just Jan Svankmajer's version left that I want to see if I ever find a way to get my hands on it...