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Alice

Play trailer Poster for Alice 1989 1h 30m Fantasy Play Trailer Watchlist
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95% Tomatometer 19 Reviews 80% Popcornmeter 10,000+ Ratings
In Czech director Jan Svankmajer's surreal adaptation of Lewis Carroll's classic children's book, Alice (Kristyna Kohoutova) follows her stuffed rabbit through a portal inside her dresser to be whisked away to Wonderland. While the White Rabbit, Mad Hatter and Cheshire Cat are still present, the familiar magical world and bizarre characters have undergone an unsettling transformation in the director's vision through the stop-motion animation of dead animals, puppets and other assorted objects.

Critics Reviews

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Noel Murray The Dissolve 04/15/2014
4/5
Nothing in Svankmajer's Alice is inappropriate per se [...] and Svankmajer does stay true to the particulars of Carroll's book. But he also put his personal stamp on Alice, by literalizing on film a lot of what reads as fantasy on the page. Go to Full Review
Philip Horne Daily Telegraph (UK) 11/26/2012
4/5
Its glorious proliferation of magical transformations works like a charm on anyone who values the imagination. Go to Full Review
Nick Schager Lessons of Darkness 09/07/2006
B+
Svankmajer's surrealist adaptation is a welcome antidote to the cute and cuddly Disneyfication of Carroll's iconic tale. Go to Full Review
Jordan M. Smith IONCINEMA.com 11/04/2020
2.5/5
vankmajer has created a terrifying stop-motion vision that sadly begins to grate with every repetition of "Said the White Rabbit." Go to Full Review
Pat Padua Spectrum Culture 08/31/2018
Alice adaptations tend toward whimsical fairy tale wonder, but a director given to animating not only stop-motion puppets but raw meat was bound to bring something more to the project, Go to Full Review
Tim Brayton Antagony & Ecstasy 12/04/2016
10/10
This is the only filmed version of the material... that persuasively places us right in the middle of a child's nightmare. Go to Full Review
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Audience Reviews

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Alec B 04/29/2024 The product of a totally uncompromised vision that is simultaneously true to its source material while finding a new way to view the story. See more Taylor W 04/15/2024 It takes one mad genius to understand another. Everything the Burton version should have been with 1/100th the budget See more Teddy B 01/12/2024 Jan Svankmajer's dreamlike, surrealist, intentionally repetitive, pensive, and abrasively terrifying direction gives this story such an off-kilter and undeniably fresh yet dingy atmosphere. I would say that this film is not for children (as that point is made questionably explicit) but I would believe that children can stomach this type of film in a much more mature way than parents will be led to believe. Fantastically dirty and eldritch in the best way imaginable and a true piece of creativity and ingenuity. See more Natalie N 08/15/2023 Saw this with my sister. We didn't understand much but we still had fun watching it. The stop motion is very impressive, but could be disturbing at time (mainly the white rabbit). I personally like movie with some unsettling atmosphere. I wasn't a big fan of the lip zoom in and the meeting of the queen of hearts was a bit underwhelming. Overall this was a fascinating watch (even though I didn't understand most of what they were saying) See more s r @ScottR 01/02/2022 1001 movies to see before you die. This was fantastic. So impressive the work that was done with minimal communist technology. Truly a masterpiece. It was on youtube. See more William L 12/11/2021 Jan Švankmajer delivers Alice in Wonderland precisely as Lewis Carroll envisioned it - full of taxidermied animals with eyes glued onto their heads in elaborate costumes and stop motion. In a world of arthouse films where projects try to be off-kilter just for the sake of differentiation, Něco z Alenky actually takes a distinct stance on one of the most commonly-referenced pieces of literature in film and television. Taking the tone of a mildly disturbing fever dream rather than a whimsical fairy tale in the manner that the Carroll classic had generally come to be interpreted in since the 1951 Disney adaptation, Alice maintains a sense of genuine confusion and a dash of fear to complement its imaginative story twists. Bringing it all together is the director's distinctive visual style, a stop-motion extravaganza that is both interesting and slightly unnerving. There are moments that will surprise you will the cleverness of the shot design and the magnitude of the planning necessary to pull them off; the later scenes with playing cards are some of teh best, particularly one where the Red Queen walks through a 'door' with a hole perfectly in her shape, momentarily forming a full card. While innovative and original, I would be lying if I said that I enjoyed every aspect of the film. The most glaring 'fault' is the narration style, in which every bit of dialogue is accompanied by a few seconds of actress Kristýna Kohoutová noting the speaker in the third person. It does eventually play a role in the story in the film's final line, but after half an hour or so you gradually slip into a bit of distress every time a character speaks, knowing that this narration is coming up after every line. To all you film buffs out there, if anyone ever asks you what your favorite adaptation of Alice in Wonderland is and you respond with "the 1988 Czechoslovakian dark surrealist fantasy version by stop-motion artist Jan Švankmajer,", then congratulations, you have successfully made sure that person never wants to talk to you again. (3.5/5) See more Read all reviews
Alice

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Movie Info

Synopsis In Czech director Jan Svankmajer's surreal adaptation of Lewis Carroll's classic children's book, Alice (Kristyna Kohoutova) follows her stuffed rabbit through a portal inside her dresser to be whisked away to Wonderland. While the White Rabbit, Mad Hatter and Cheshire Cat are still present, the familiar magical world and bizarre characters have undergone an unsettling transformation in the director's vision through the stop-motion animation of dead animals, puppets and other assorted objects.
Director
Jan Svankmajer
Producer
Peter-Christian Fueter
Screenwriter
Jan Svankmajer
Production Co
Condor Films, Film Four International
Genre
Fantasy
Original Language
Czech
Release Date (Streaming)
Apr 17, 2020
Runtime
1h 30m