Anyway, gentle reader, I thought it was ... ok. I guess. There were a couple of little kids in the audience who were really scared, and I have to say my friend Miss Nellie in the next seat was a bit spooked by the Jabberwocky, which is, of course, the whole point, but if you're considering taking your kids, maybe think again? I don't think it's a kid's film. Also, from the historical accuracy POV, I have issues (yes, I know, you know I have issues...) about sending a 19 year old girl out dressed as a child, no ladies maid or nanny (still with a nanny at 19? I don't think so!!) would have let her out of the house without a corset (they had corsets for 8 year olds, for pete's sake) or stockings & bloomers... Just not done, y'know.
I think Alice's outfits throughout the film were seriously weird, too. All that off-the-shoulder, just barely tied on, stuff? What was the message there? The only outfit I thought was halfway 'sensible' was the jacket & trousers she had on just before she went off to the Champion - was she dressed like a boy there because Burton was trying to say that only boys can be champions?
The Victorians were a bit weird, though, too, weren't they? They had some very strange ideas about what was OK for kids and what wasn't - I remember being given a copy of 'The Water Babies' when I was about 8 or 9 and being horrified by how gruesome that was - and that was another Victorian smash hit (thank the Oversoul nobody has decided to make that into a film!!)...
I remember from my brief career as a bookseller that we had some pretty gruesome Victorian illustrated books (I just tried to find them on Google, so if you never hear from me again, assume that DOCS* has come & taken me away for child endangerment) in our kids section...
And today I ordered this:
No prizes for guessing what I'm going to do it it. Or even what it is... you'll just have to wait and see!
