Weirdhouse Cinema: Alice (1988)

I guess I think maybe just kind of off hand conversation many many months back, you said, well, you know, if I were to pick a Weird House film, I'd go with Alice from UH film by check stop motion animation master John's funk Meyer. And here we are. You know, I think the listener might have been in on that conversation. I think that might have happened in a listener mail episode in real time. So so yeah, I think that the audience has been along with us for this entire ride.

Here we are at our destination. Yeah, this this is a film I had never watched before. I was familiar with it because I'm familiar with um with Jon s frank Meyer's work to a certain extent. I've seen some of his work before, and we'll get into that as as we go. But yeah, setting down and watching this for the first time, this was an experience I had just hours ago. I mean, it's it's it's a wonderful film.

It's one I've I've grown up with um and because of that, I love to introduce people to it because I do think that if people, I mean there are there are obviously hundreds of adaptations of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, mostly because it's public domain, but it's also got really great recognizability, and I think more than that, it's actually just a truly wonderful book. Like like, it's one of my favorite children's books full stop. Probably just one of

my favorite books period. Like, I think Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is probably the first book that I fell in love with as a child that never went away. You know. Obviously there's a lot of children's books that kind of fall by the wayside, but that one I was like, oh no, this is like high quality literature that can stick with me throughout the ages, and and it has. It's been a book that I've read dozens of times. So how how did this film come into your life?

Do you remember, particularly like how you ended up watching it for the first time, and how you latched onto it. I think, and this this is a while ago, so I'm not entirely sure. I think as a youth, there was a specific adaptation from the nineteen eighties of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland that I really enjoyed that took yeah, and so I think I was trying to track that one down, and instead I came across this nineteen eighties adaptation of Alice in Wonderland, started watching it, and then

just like, nope, I'm going to finish this. You know this is the wrong adaptation, but I'm here for it.

For for my own part, I think I basically came into John's funk Meyer a couple of ways via interest in like industrial music, and then also by virtue of moving to Atlanta, where we have the Center for Puppetry Art, and pretty at least at the time, there's kind of a robust, uh independent puppetry art scene, and and also a great video rental store in Video Drone that has a lot of the films, a lot of the films all of john S Funkmeyer, and also many of the

individuals who are either his peers or people that influenced him and um And in terms of like downstream influences, like I feel like, especially in the West, like if you were someone who did any kind of weird puppetry or weird stop motion, I feel like his work is

probably or was probably on your radar. So even things like creepy tool videos, which I think for a lot of people like that's kind of your first um introduction to strange stop motion, Like even that I don't think would exist without a world in which we have Jance Funkmeyer. I think there's a couple of really mainstream influences that the average person has seen too. For example, both Wes Anderson stop motion films Uh, The Fantastic Mr Fox and

um Isle of Dogs. Both of them have this very deliberate look where the characters have for and they clearly kind of rustle a bit from frame to frame. You can see the you can see the handmade aesthetic in them, and that I think is is clearly an influence and homage and just kind of like an aesthetic choice that Jan spank Meyer and you know, his contemporaries were doing and they were doing it just because it's it's what they were able to do the the Wes Anderson films.

I think they're doing it as like a note, we want this to look handmade, we want you to see the creator in every frame, just like these older stop motion projects. So I think it's a wonderful look and it does feel very handmade. You know. Yeah, there's they're strong tactile um details in this film, like and and it gets into the soundscape as well that we'll we'll discuss here in a bit, like every all these very very little objects that are manipulated, all the things and

creatures that are moving around. Um, it's I guess this this might be to a certain some extent what Joe sometimes describes as I rubbed the fur film tho the same thing, and that you can imagine yourself holding these objects. They're they're all these little often grimy or not really grimy details. But uh, I don't know this whole film. There are many times in the film where I like

really wanted to grab a broom. The meat freaking me was like I could get a broom in there and and do some work, and also perhaps warned this young girl not to touch these things. You know, don't don't stick your finger in that, Alice. No, a lot of these things seemed very dangerous, and I was worried for her, which which I'm sure is intentional from the director. Now, Alice, I think it is very much a fascinating film, one worth seeking out. But I think you do need to

know what getting into here. Um, this isn't really a warning, but just just letting you know. This is a film with a very very subdued pacing, a single human actor who is also a child, strange ruinous sets, bizarre stop motion animation, and virtually no musical score. It's also far more watchable and enjoyable than anything I just said makes it sound. Uh, it's not nearly as creepy as as that is it makes, as we may be making it sound,

but it's also not un creepy. I mean, I think this is for children and adults who who like the darker side of fantasy, you know. I mean, like, for example, when I grew up, and I'm sure you were the same, I loved things like Labyrinth and The Dark Crystal. So so therefore this fit in that for me. Obviously it's a bit more art house than either of those, but but it's still you know, it would would be a part of that world, at least into my child eyes

and partially to my adult eyes. Yeah, yeah, I mean there's something in this film that some might say or interpreted as it is horrific but or or scary, But I don't know, I don't I don't think there's anything overtly scary or mean about the film. I think for the most part, there is this sense of wonder. It may be get kind of a dark leaning wonder, but

it is authentic wonder. And there's like a sense of humor to it too, Like I I believe Jon spank Meyer he must have known some of these grotesque puppets that he created had kind of a goofy look to them, you know. And and and in fact, there's there's one shot which perhaps I would say is the only quote unquote scary shot of like almost like a jump scare from like a frog creature, but it's he's got such a goofy face that you aren't really scared. It's just

sort of like, what is that? Yeah, the creatures we encounter are generally silly enough looking that it kind of disarms the terror that might that you might expect to be there when saying things like and then the poorly taxidermy and rotting animals come alive and start crawling all over the place. It's true, it's it's it's a charming version of poorly animated taxidermy. Duff. Yeah, yeah, no, it's it's it's fun and goofy and charming and disturbing and

dirty and a little frightening. Um. When I was trying to think of elevator pitches for the film, I mean,

for to a certain extent, doesn't need one. It's kind of a legendary film and and that's kind of the maybe one of the challenges and even talking about it because like with within and you can speak more to this than I can, but within the world of stop motion and stop motion animation, like this is a big film, like and this is a master we're dealing with here, and not not even to mention the subject matter, Like I think, even if someone hasn't seen this film, I

would bet the vast majority of our audience has probably read the book, or the very least is familiar with all of the beats that happened in this very unconventional story. Yeah, and it does stick to a lot of the major beats, so which I do that. I think that helps with what was force funk Meyer his first if I'm correct on this, his first full length film, uh, coming after

coming off of a string of shorter animated subjects. But knowing that those beats are in place, that kind of helps propel you through what is essentially, you know, a feature length art film. Yeah. No, I feel the same way, Like like, even when I'm watching it, I'm most familiar with the book that I am with any of the film adaptations. When when certain like points in the story hits,

I'm like, oh, they're playing croquet. I know where we are, you know, like we're starting to wrap this up, you know. But if I were to do an elevator pitch, I'd say, it's it's Alice in Wonderland, except in one of the houses from Silent Hill, but with the lights turned up a bit, so it's not that scary. I think it's a it's a fair pitch. There are a lot there's a lot of trying to unlock doors and not being

able to. There are a lot of like range set pieces and props, and then of course bizarre creatures that you encounter. All right, let's go ahead and listen to the trailer audio. This is a legitimate trailer audio from the at least the English version of the film. And I think it's quite nice because it does it certainly doesn't give you any of the rich visuals that are of course the main reason for watching the film, but it does, I think, perfectly capture many of the elements

of the sound skin. I shall be too late side the white traffic, how lazy side the white traffic. Well, the Queen will be curious much of the white trappic our invitations for Alice from the queen, said the white trabbic, off with the heck, greeen the Queen. Now we'll we'll

come back to this of course. But yeah, what you just heard, the the narration by Alice, the those kind of ambient industrial sound effects that are happening in the background, like this is the this is the soundscape of the film, and and it's um. I I know folks who have never really encountered art cinema that when I've shown them this, they found that very cloying. But I think if if

you just accept it, I think it's perfectly fine. I mean, in fact, I would say it's a good thing that really uh enhances the overall aesthetics of the film, And I think it's perfectly chosen. But yeah, I mean, I'm not warning you. I'm just letting you know that it's art.

This is art house. Maybe. Yeah, so you're you're you're talking about the the Alice narration, the how she's she's reading the things that the other people are saying, are saying, and then she creatures are saying that she's saying, um, you know, the Mad Hatter said yeah, And and that's always accompanied by a close up of her mouth when she describes all those kind of descriptive verbs, things like Alice thought, Alice said the red the Mad Hatter yelled.

You know, whenever one of those, like you know, dialogue descriptors is happening, one of those dialogue verbs, it's a close up of Alice's mouth kind of kind of saying that. But but in addition to that, also that the the just the sound design. I've had friends tell me it's very cloying, just like the sounds of all the scuttling bones scissors chomping away and yeah, all that. We'll, we'll,

we'll definitely discuss this as we proceed. So at this point you might be wondering, Hey, where should I go if I want to see this film? Well, you might be able to stream this via some of your arts and your streaming sources. There. There's so many places to stream films these days, I can't even begin to keep track of them all, but it looks like you might

be able to find it on some of those. It might also be available to digitally rent or buy, at least in some markets the UK, for example, I watched it on a risk store Blu ray edition that I rented from Video Drome. Here in Atlanta, they also have the DVD and just a superb collection of stop motion offering. So if you're local to the Atlanta area and are interested in films like this, well they've they've got your back. All right. Well, let's talk about some of the people

involved here. Again, they're not not not really a lot in terms of cast, but we do have to talk a little bit about Jan's funk Meyer, the director, writer, and production designer for this film. So he was born as of this recording is still with us legendary check stop motion animator and and I think just general multimedia artist. I think one thing to keep in mind, especially with this film, and I think this applies to so many

of his other films as well. It's like, it's not just wall to wall stop motion, their whole sequences where it's Alice interacting with a strange environment, but there's there's not something like crawling across the screen the whole time. I guess also we should really state that in this stop motion film, Alice is often a human girl interacting

with stop motion taxidermy and bones. But when she shrinks, as people know she often does in the book, she turns into quite often a little creepy doll version of herself. So sometimes Alice the character is a stop motion doll, and sometimes Alice is a full grown human being being filmed on a camera, and so so it jumps back and forth, it's all over the place, and so sometimes it's like puppetry interacting with with the live action Alice.

Sometimes it's a split screen where you see live action Alice on one side and stop motion on the other. It's it's it's a whole combination of effects and Uh, it's it's wonderful. You're never fooled by like, oh, that's not real Alice, you know, like like it's it's obvious when it switches over, but it's it's always perfectly charming and believable and like, um, as the Disney animators would say, it's the plausible impossible, like everything follows a through line.

It all makes sense. So sung Bier has been active since the mid nineteen sixties and i've and it seems to still be active. Uh. Over the course of his career, his unique surrealistic style has been highly influential, especially on such filmmakers as Terry Gilliam also the Americans stop motion duo The Brothers k or Key or Quay. We we actually just looked this up to try and get the definitive answer, and uh we found it pronounced all three ways.

So um, my apologies for inevitably getting it wrong twice two out three times, but at least he got it right once. Yeah, one of those has to be correct. Uh. Certainly more familiar with their work than uh, you know, interviews with them, but they have a very distinctive style

that's reminiscent of sync Meyer. Uh. At any rate, all all of these individuals have also been highly influential as well, of course, So again I think it's not that much of a stretch at all to say that most of the range of surreal stop motion animation you're finding in the world has at least some connection to spank Meyer's work or or that general period in world of stop motion animation. Some of sink Meyer's most notable works include Faust from Little O Tech from two thousand and Surviving

Life from two thousand ten. His many short films include Jabberwockie from seventy one, Leonardo's Diary from seventy two, and and Castle of Otranto from ninety seven. So I don't know about you step from my own, from my own part um, I think I went through a period, this is maybe fifteen years ago where I was again into

strange puppetry and I was getting into stop motion. I remember renting numerous discs from the likes of Spec Meyer, also Jerry Barta, who was another big name in check stop motion, The Brothers, the Brothers k that we just mentioned. Um So my memory is a little little faint on on all of it, Like some is getting confused about which work was directed by which uh individual or duo? UM. I know I watched some of Feankmeyer's shorts, and I believe I watched two thousands Little Oh Tech. But a

lot of this kind of blends together. But I know that I had never watched Alice, so I've been seeing it on the rental shelf for years. Yeah. For for me, um, it was all about stop motion growing up. UM. I still love stop motion. It's still one of my favorite

mediums of just filmmaking in general. But you know, as you know, I have a big background in um animation for film and television, and it's just such a beautiful, expensive, time consuming process, and I just I just adore that it exists, like like by every standard of like um, you know, financial and labor and all these other reasons no one should do stop motion, but people want it to exist, so people make it exist, you know, And and so I really respect that, and uh yeah, that's

just false in that camp for me, I feel like I've seen multiple documentaries where at some point there's the visionary, there's the artist who says I want to make a full length stop motion film, and someone is telling them, no, you really don't want to do this. You should not do this. Yeah, it's like you you don't have the money, you don't have the time. You know that the audience doesn't exist for it. Like, for example, my favorite stop motion studio right now, not a surprise, is like they're

based out of Portland, Oregon. They make wonderful films. Um, I'd have to double check to make sure these numbers are correct, but at least last time I checked every single Like a stop motion film has become less and less profitable, has made a smaller profit every single time. That's not a way that that you can run a business. But they keep doing it, and I thank them for that because I love their films, you know, and it's

I love I just love stop motion. I think it's a wonderful process and and it's aesthetics really just appeal to me now as as a as a child or a young filmmaker yourself. Did you did you do any stop motion? Did you make any little experimental films? I did?

I did? Um. I literally remember the first one I ever did, which was with some playto um a camera like literally just a camera camera, and um, I think it was like a ninja turtle toy and it was about a guy getting hit in the head with a meteor and so then I had to use it like a flipbook and to have it all come together. And this is when I was gosh, maybe like seven or eight, and it didn't really work. You know, the idea of like having the camera like, you know, locked down, did I?

I did. Didn't understand that yet. And you know how many frames you really need to like you know, experience uh that that your eye to like see the motion itself, twelve frames per second, all that jazz. No, no, no, I didn't know any of that. Um. But then when I did get into college, and you know, I my my my animation studios at my university had like all the equipment. Of course, I hopped right on it. One

of my favorites I ever did. This is kind of cheating when it comes to stop motion, but I made a short film using a light bright as stop motion, which I loved. I thought thought that was it turned out so beautifully, it was so much fun to do, and um but yeah, yeah, no, I love stop motion and uh yeah, people rarely pay me for it because people can't afford it. But in my own time, and for my own like student films and stuff, I would

use it all the time. The kids today have it, I guess a lot easier to experiment with it because I know my my own son has done some stop motion experimentation because they have apps that can help with it. Uh. And so I've I've seen some of these that he's done where there's some sort of like Plato or Lego creature crawling around and doing something. You know, isn't it not super long? But I was really impressed when I

saw it. And and who knows, maybe twenty years from now he'll be coming to me and saying, Dad, I need I need some help financing my feature length stop motion animation film. Exactly. We can only hope now. UM. I also just want to make a point here again, we can't go We could spend a whole, a whole lot of time talking about John smenc Meyer uh, and I don't want to. I also don't want to want

to over stress his importance. I don't want to state that like he is check stop motion animation because check puppetry and uh and subsequently um stop motion animation. And this goes back quite a while, and there there are other big names in check stop motion summer contemporaries, um of spank Meyer. But then you also have some that kind of predate him, such as Jerry trunka who nineteen

twelve through nineteen sixty nine. Who Um. I'm not super familiar with his work either, but I know that he did a lot of like children's stop motion animated films for the check market. All right. As we mentioned, this is of course based on the work of Lewis Carroll.

Lewis Carroll this was the name of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, who lived eighteen thirty two through, best remembered for Alice in Wonderland from eighteen sixty five, It's sequel Through the Looking Glass from eighteen seventy one, and such poems as Jabberwocke from eighteen seventy one. His style is often described as literary nonsense, but he was also an inventor of games,

as well as both an academic and recreational mathematician. He suffered from migrains, which has often been discussed in connection with some of his more hallucinatory ideas, and we actually have a migraine aura that is called Alice in Wonderland syndrome. The details of his personal life have been subject to much speculation and analysis over the years, leading to a

various darker interpretations of his life and work. We see this reflected as well in such films as Night five, Dream Child, in which Dodgson is played by Ian Holme. All Right, we're gonna get into the cast of this film, but it's it's it's not gonna take a lot of time. Alice. The physical performance is played by a child actor named Christina Quotova. This is her only acting credit, but I will say she's quite good in the film. The film

really ultimately demands a lot of her. She's constantly crawling into and through things, interacting with sets and props that involved things like broken glass and um, yeah, I'm just gonna assume everything was was safe. But watching this, you do and part of it is like the you know, they're very believable fears like oh, don't don't get too close to the glass, don't be careful handling that, I don't know that that that jar of jam that also

has thumbtacks in it, things like that. But so she often feels slightly imperil without it being like a real movie peril feeling. But anyway, she's quite good. I also really thought multiple times, like, wow, you've got a great like silent actor vibe going, you know, like just pulling

perfect faces is at perfect moments. Um, just just just very believable as this child and also very like I guess relatable to like like like she she doesn't feel like she's acting despite the fact that the artifice is very clear in this film, Like it's it's right up

front from the first words, which we'll we'll get to later. Yeah, the way that Alice is betrayed, the way that this performance works is that you don't have you don't have often in kids films where kid is interacting with some sort of a puppet or other um, you know, artificial creature or even like some sort of a clown or fantastic character, you know, there's sometimes kind of a laughable quality to it, like a like an oh shucks kind of cuteness to it. But Alice is it's pretty serious

through most of the film. A lot of time we have a lot of these shots of her staring directly through the camera's lens at some wondrous site, and she

has has this very kind of serious look. That's kind of this this kid's face that has a lot of analysis and suspicion, that kind a face where like you're at the supermarket or something and a child is staring at you from a from a cart, you know, a child you don't know, and they're just looking at you like they're they're they're trying to figure you out, but they are very suspicious of you. That's well put. Yeah, so that too, I think adds to the vibe of

the film. Now, I think we you watched the English language version as well, didn't you? Or did you watch a dub version? The version I have is a DVD where there are no other language options other than dubbed into English with an English actor. That's the only version that I have. Okay, that's that seems to be the case with the version I watched as well. The voice of Alice in this is the voice of Camilla power Born.

She's an Irish born English actress who appeared in various British TV productions over the years, including Whitechapel, Waterloo Road and Hornblower Duty. She also appears in the Black Mirror episode Shut Up Dance, which was a pretty dark one that that that one's really good. One of my favorites about Shut Up and Dance is that it's one of the few Black Mirror episodes that have nothing um supernatural and nothing science fiction about them. That they are it's

it's all science fact. What happens and Shut Up and Dance could happen tomorrow period. You know, it's it's frightening. Yeah. Yeah. The the only thing really speculative about it is sort of the I don't know the the how intricate the

situation is, but that alone doesn't make it unbelievable. Yeah. Yeah. Uh. The The other interesting thing about Camilla Power is that she played Jill Pole in the TV adaptation of C. S. Lewis's Narnia book The Silver Chair, alongside Tom Baker who played puddle Glom and Warwick Davis who played glim Feather. I love these BBC adaptations for the late eighties early nineties. Did you watch these two? Yeah? I remember watching these like during the middle of summer day on a on

a PBS channel that we were receiving via antenna. So you already have that sort of that that you know, that that British TV style that is very much in effect in these productions, and then also it was partially scrambled via antenna. Yeah. Yeah, now they're they're they're really great and um they've actually gotten all for some reason. In all the adaptations of the Narnia books, uh, very few ever actually finished the series. Most people get one or two in then they realize that it's an uphill

battle for those last few books, they just stop. This one got further than most. I think this one got at least four maybe five books in so um because they combined some stories into one, which which helps with that. But uh, yeah, it's it's it's a fun one. If anyone's ever looking for like a really corny eighties adaptation, uh, look up the BBC Narnia. I guess, I guess they called it a mini series back then. They're long, they have really like handmade special effects, and the acting is

very like community theater. It's it's great. Yeah. I remember the final battle in the Narni in the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, the first one. It has like really kind of poorly integrated Uh, it's like traditional animation utilized in the battle for some of the creatures. It looks like our heroes are just kind of like swatting it flies and then yeah, there's just these ghosts which aren't really interacting at all, just kind of swirling on screen.

It's um, it's it's it's great. Yeah. I watched it with my my son after we watched the more recent Narnia film, which of course is a special effects laden, big budget affair, and um, he's still He definitely was like, well, this doesn't look quite as real, but but he also I think you found it very amusing now that this is interesting. Um. The Dutch version of Alice features the

voice of Harris van Houten as well. Uh, this is not the version we watched, but it's notable trivia because van Howden is a Dutch actor, probably best known in English film for her role as Melissandra in the Game of Thrones series. That's pretty amazing. So yeah, I wonder

how old she was. I I can't do the math in my mind, and I refused to, but but yeah that that' that would be interesting as well, because because she does have such like a kind of matching the the physical actor kind of like that sternness as Melissandra. So yeah, that that that'd be interesting. To see. Yeah, because Alice in this film, and I guess like Alice traditionally as well, like Atlas, is going to stand up to weird, fantastic creatures that are being ridiculous. Uh, you know,

she's not gonna take any crap off of these things. Now, Normally at this point we tend to highlight somebody involved in the music, but again, there's not really any music in this film, at least not for the vast majority of it, so there's no credited composer. But I did want to at least highlight the sound credits, which go to Robert Johnson and Evo Spougege in particular has a ton of it's mostly check films, but he also worked

on a dus Um. Again, I think there were singling out because the sound and folly work I thought was was pretty incredible. There's a great deal of rooting around in this film. Alice is constantly exploring drawers, cramped spaces, and strange potentially dangerous objects. Reanimated and decaying taxidermide animals

are constantly doing the same thing. And so for the you know, the whole film, in lieu of music, we kind of have this ambient industrial soundscape of noises that all there reminded me a lot of the Folly Work and Planet of the Vampires. There's something kind of almost hypnotic about it. There's almost kind of an A S. M. R. Effect. At least that's the way I felt listening to these various sound effects. Yeah, it's like what's happening on the screen.

Not only are you hearing the sound, but the sound is like almost within you. It's like right around you. It's it's it's much louder than it should be in a realistic adaptation of what's happening on screen. But but no, no, it works perfectly because it is not only is it so important to a story with very little dialogue and no music, but it's so important because these extra i'll

call them heightened noises match the heightened visuals perfectly. Like um, but like when these scissors clank, it is a rusty, dirty, loud pair of scissors on screen and in your ear that that they match. Yeah, it definitely helps bring the

visuals to life. And I was also thinking about how it's interesting that we have a film with again creatures and things and sights and sets that that one might be attempted to interprets creepy or even scary, But the sounds in the film, the soundscape doesn't push you in either direction. Like you could imagine a version of this film where you have like ridiculous, cute, disarming music to sort of say, hey, this white rabbit, it's not creepy,

listen because listen to the music. Or the other side of that, of course, is really like, you know, turn the wheel in the direction of the dark and have something some creepy sound effects that make everything seem creepier than they are. Instead, no, the the visuals are kind of uh, you know, left um unaugmented by music, and you're I guess you're more inclined to sort of take them at face value and also see them more purely

through the lens of how Alice interacts with them. And I think it matches the subject matter and especially this adaptation of the subject matter, very well, because I mean, ultimately, the story of Alice in Wonderland is an internal story. It's one individual girl, a lot of internal dialogue, a lot a lot of running monologue with her, and it's what she thinks, what she feels. It's all very internal and in this adaptation, it's all also taking place more

or less in a single household. Therefore, it is it does feel like an abandoned child old thinking to herself. And if that's if that's the case, you don't have score. It is a child thinking up everything by herself. That it feels more accurately lonely to have no score. And

these heightens, you know, very imaginative sound effects. We mentioned already that in these these bits of narration where Alice says something like the Mad Hatter said, or Alice thought to herself, we see her her lips, her mouth moving. And I don't know how much of this is a product of like remastered film, uh, but but I think

this was intentional. Surely the lips are a little bit chapped, the teeth are of course their children's teeth, as they're a little bit crooked, they're they're a little bit stained. And I feel like that kind of matches up with this this idea that you just mentioned of like, um, almost a wild child, a child that is that has maybe not had as much parental uh supervision and attention and therefore is retreating more into the imagined world. That

this is just purely anecdotal connections in my mind. But um, there's this episode of Breaking Bad where Jesse is like trying to be a tough guy. So he's gonna go get his money that he's owed by so and so blah blah blah. And when he gets there, there's this heartbreaking, you know, little child who lives in squalor. And it's just this, this this little boy is just by himself making do with you know, no resources in a filthy like hovel of a home. That's what it reminds me of.

With Alice, there is in many ways it does feel like an abandoned child just making do with what she has. Yeah, and that that that's not too belittle this, this poor fictional child in Breaking Bad. My heart goes out for that poor fictional child. All right, well, let's let's get into the plot of Alice. So to begin with, Um, this story begins just like the book does. And and I guess I'll say in advance that basically the adaptation

is very close to the source material. There there are big chunks that have been exercised and are just moved without even mentioning that they've been removed. But for the most part, if it happened in the book, it's adaptation on screen is pretty similar. Obviously, the circumstances in which it's like, you know, adapted, are very different. You know that there is no real world other than what happens in this one kind of run down house. But but but it's it's pretty accurate for one to one. So

the as the book begins, so do we. We begin with Alice and her sister sitting along the river bank. The sister is reading a book and Alice has a bunch of rocks in her lap and she's throwing them into the river one by one. I liked the detail, and this made even more sense later when I was reminded of some of the plot elements. But the sister's face or head is never seen. We see her from the She's just from the neck down, which which I thought was nice because there's the sense like there's no

attention there for Alice. This is not someone who's regarding Alice really as a as as a as a as a human being, or or or or anything. But then also of we have the whole off with their head thing later, which perhaps reflects this as well. So keep this scene in mind, listeners, will We'll be back to it in just a moment. But so my first thoughts are that this is a very age appropriate Alice, which I appreciate quite often Alice is depicted as quite a bit older, which you know, I mean, we all have

childlike wonder in our lives. But I think the big point with the Alice story is that she is literally a child making do with a child's logic. And you know, I mean like I've seen adaptations where, like, you know, an adult Kate Beck and Sale is playing Alice, which is fun at all, but it just it's it's not quite the same, you know what, When it's a legitimate child child, I just think the story works better. And uh, I also like that this this child isn't like cutesie precocious.

She's kind of bratty and kind of just like selfish and like a fun realistic way, like she feels like a real child. So in this, you know, selfish brady kind of a point of view. Are are our hero? Alice is just reaching over starts playing with her sister's book, just kind of like flipping the pages like a flip book, and her sister reaches over and slaps her hand immediately we get our first close up of Alice's mouth as she says Alice thought to herself, and then we cut

to Alice as the title screen. Uh. Now we go back to the Alice mouth and now here here's what she says, which is just a wonderful way to start a film. Alice thought to herself, Now you will see a film. And this just breaks the fourth wall immediately, letting us all know that we're all on the same page here. And uh, then these more title cards just kind of interrupt Alice's speech as she's talking, and then she says made for children perhaps, but I nearly forgot.

You must close your eyes otherwise you won't see anything. Great way to set up this story, keeping it kind of non sensical, um, making sure that we know that everyone's on board with being fantasy. That you get it. It turned out great. Oh yeah, and as we mentioned this internal dialogue verb description, it will continue for the entire film, So anytime someone says or thinks or does anything, it's it's it's it's coupled with Alice's close up mouth

saying Alice thought, Alice said, etcetera. And it Uh. I liked how it gave it a formal, almost ritualistic air, you know, like, um, you know, I get some sort of religious right that's taking place here, I guess it. It also reminded me of refrains from works like you know, quote The Raven Nevermore, that sort of thing, And it's a great way to interpret. Like I said, what is a very internal story. How how do you do that without just simple voice you know, voice over, which is

kind of kind of the standard option. In fact, I remember back when UM Walt Disney did their very famous adaptation of Alice in Wonderland. When they initially released it to theaters, it failed, It was not as successful as they wanted it to be. And when asked about it, Walt Disney said, oh, well, it's too much of an internal story. And he said it's also he also, I think blamed Alice's lack of like proactive action taking. But but ultimately it is despite the fact that is it's

adapted perpetually. It is kind of a hard thing to adapt the internal monologue of of of this child, you know, yeah, yeah, how do you how do you make or feel like a full fledged character and not just this um, you know, agentless observer of weird things, especially as most filmmakers consider a voice over to be a lazy way. You know, it's it's it's telling, not showing. So that's that's that's tough. So so now remember where we were. She was sitting

on the river banks with her sister. These opening credits happened real quick, and now boom, Alice is now indoors. We see some quick establishing shots panning around the room at you know, it's decrepit nature, discarded apple cores, peeling wallpaper, chip paint, old mouse traps. Uh. And then we see these two very frightening old dolls sitting side by side, and one of the dolls has a lap full of rocks, which now Alice is is picking up from the dolls

lap and tossing into a half drunk teacup. So there we go, even this nice gentle opening of of of river banks and sisters reading. No, it's just Alice by herself with two dolls being alone, just just not really. Just get used to it, folks, where we're gonna have

a lot of Alice by herself using her imagination. So uh, the only sound we were hearing right now is a loud ticket clock and it's just Alice sitting by herself until until suddenly we hear a creaking off screen, so Alice looks up to see what what what that sound is, and there is a taxidermied white rabbit in sort of like a glass diorama type situation with like you know, it's scientific name labeled and all that stuff what you

would find in a museum or collector's home. And this rabbit is has come to life and is struggling against the nails holding it in position inside this class diorama. Yes, yes, this scene is just fabulous. This is the one where after I finished the film, I had to go back and rewatch this film immediately because it's just so good with like the every detail of this rabbit, from the eyes to its you know, protruding teeth, to the the way the way it deals with those little nails stuck

through its hand. And also again I'll probably drive this home multiple times, but this scene is not as creepy as as it may sound when we're just describing it. There's a lot more whimsy and humor to it. And when we refer to these taxidermied creatures, none of them are done very well they all have that uncanny look of something that's been poorly taxidermied. So keep that in mind if you haven't seen this, like really bugged out glass eyes. Yeah, too much, too much view, like the

teeth or to expose. Uh, most of them I think are also visually falling apart, like they're stuffing coming out of them and so forth. So, so the white rabbit is struggling, struggling, struggling. He finally gets free, uh, and he pulls up, revealing two giant nails protruding from each palm. So it reaches up with its giant rabbit teeth, bites off the nails and spits them to the floor. And then it pulls a drawer of clothing up from the

ground inside of the diorama. So already starting with that that like you know, mythical Oh it's larger on the inside, kind of lodge now. Uh. It then gets dressed from the clothing inside of the drawer. It takes a large pair of scissors out of the drawer and then breaks the surrounding glass at the diorama to make an escape.

And this scene, too is just the stop motion work is tremendous, and the and the fantasy of the whole thing is also splendid, Like all the details of like pulling on the gloves, I love because you can you clearly see it has it's it's a taxidermy rabbit, so it has rabbits appendages. But as the glove comes on, and the glove is is stretched fully on, it's able to then flex all the little fingers in the gloved hand. And just every detail in this is so beautifully rendered.

Now no one calamity that has occurred, uh, will repeat throughout the throughout the film. Is that in his attempts to escape the this white rabbit has torn a little uh, I guess, just a little fissure. I I don't know what to call it. He's got a little hole now worn in his chest which is leaking um sawdust. That this this will repeat many many times. That there are a few repeating gags. That's one of them, for sure. Another one which I won't draw too much attention to,

but is is funny. Every time Alice tries to open a drawer, the knob falls off. It's pointless, doesn't really advance the story. It just contributes to our our character, Alice falling on the ground often yeah, uh so, So we get our first um oh dear, oh dear, I shall be late from the white rabbit, but it's voiced by Alice, and then once again we are treated to another up close mouth shots of her explaining the white

rabbit said. The rabbit then runs off, and now the room has magically expanded and we are now outdoors in a giant, craggy dirt field with just a little uh desk drawer sitting right in the middle. She goes up to it, tries to take off the drawer. Of course, the knob falls off, she falls down, She pries it open, and then crawls through the drawer, once again showing that we are in a mythical, magical world at this point.

If you're familiar with the Alice in Wonderland story, you can more or less tell where we're headed at this point. We're headed towards the Alice falling down the rabbit hole. This whole scene kind of just mirrors that. We next see the white rabbit eating a bowl full of sawdust, presumably replenishing what has leaked out, But he has not yet sown closed the the chest wound, so the sawdust just keeps pouring out as he eats it. Again, not as creepy as it sounds, but you know, he's in

a hurry. He doesn't have time to just stop and and and and pay a lot of attention to this gaping hole in his chest. Better to just have a quick snack of sawdust and then keep moving. He also stores his pocket watch in this hole in his chest, so every time he takes it out, he has to lick the sawdust off the front glass of his pocket watch. Yes, white rabbit runs off, and then so Alice passes by the sawdust and I'll try that. She has a couple of bites singing up. I don't like it, yeah her again.

Her childlike curiosity kind of gets her into trouble at times, and he seemed to like it. Yeah, I like the rabbit is eating. I'm gonna try it. Or this looks like jam, of course, I'm going to try and see what it tastes like. So Alice then pulls a classic

sideshow bob move. She steps on an upturned rake. It flings up and hits her in the face, and then she falls backwards into a cooking pot, which then turns into a portal which she then falls through, and we're now in uh absolutely a a descending elevator scene which very closely mirrors the followed down a rabbit hole. Yeah,

this is the one. Whether it's like she's going down and they're all these just shelves of of things, right Like, it's a lot of it looks like like very old preserved foods, but also maybe preserve specimens, and then also jars of like random dangerous looking crafting supplies. And then sometimes there's a merger of the two, like you see more than once in this film. You see what looks like like bread like bagats or or and so forth that have like nails emerging from them, or tax stuck

in that stuck in them. And this is where we get something you mentioned before, which is one of my favorite I supposed to give Joe Credit a rub the fir moment Alice is descending in this elevator, she reaches out and she grabs just a jar of marmalade off a shelf as she passes, as she does in the book as well, but unlike the book, she she examines it and it's a jar of marmalade with a saran

wrap top. She takes her finger and all of this is the sound design is wonderful, which takes her finger punctures the suran rap brings up a big finger full of the marmalade, and there's a giant thumbtack on her finger and it's just like wow, Like the the feelings that you get from seeing this and and hearing this is just out of this world. So so yeah, she doesn't want this. Thankfully, she does not eat the thumb

tac what are the few things she doesn't eat? And then she puts it back on the shelf and we can continue with our story. And this of course leads to the the big hall of Doors scene where you know, there's a key on a table and you know, she she's first figuring out that she can be too big and too small to eat me, drink me all that stuff. Now, like we mentioned, uh, when she does change into a a small character, you know, like like it's often shown in the book, she turns into a creepy old doll

with with stop motion stuff. But instead of a little you know, cherry cordial or whatever it is that that is the drink that she drinks, it's a bottle of ink. She just pops that cork drinks it down like I she first she tests it, she dips her finger in like said, oh, this is fine, and then she drinks it so yeah that the drinking the bottle of ink makes her shrink. Then she's gonna wants to go through this beautiful door to get to the big, beautiful garden

like from the book. But of course in this adaptation, there is no beautiful garden. It's like a very small, like almost like doll house exterior, kind of like it's it's like a tiny little stage play diorama, that's what it looks like. But she sees the white rabbits and there she wants to go there too. She doesn't have the key, darnet now and you get big And then this is one of the first appearances of these very creepy looking cakes that the traditional eat meat cake. And

I can't tell what it is. It looks kind of like minced meat, maybe caviare What did you think it was, Robert, Yeah, I got kind of it's weird because on one, it doesn't look inedible to me. Uh, it looks like maybe there's some sort of a mincemeat or um or some sort of very brown, very type of thing, you know,

going on maybe ground dates. But then there's something on top that I guess is a like a sliver of a nut or something, perhaps, yeah, some sort of seed, but it also kind of looks like a tooth, yes, and it makes it look very strange. Yeah, But she eats it, and of course she grows big. Now she can reach the key, but now she's too big to go through the door, etcetera, etcetera. Y'all know this story. But she starts to cry, and now she has cried an entire ocean. Uh she she she shrinks down a

bit again. And now here's here's here's here's a wonderful part. I absolutely love this if you know the book. Next up, we get a mouse swim by in this giant ocean of tears. Now this, this mouse has decided it's time to rest, you know, trying to make some lunch. So it goes up to this island that it sees, which is Alice's head bobbing in the water. Not even like discreetly bobbing, it's just a child's head. But no, no, no, the mouse crawls upon top, hammers steaks into her head

and then sets up a hole. I mean, this is a step by step process of this mouse setting up a campfire, uh, setting up a meal, opening cans with a tiny little can opener, dropping its little like cooking pot into the water, and bringing it up with a rope. And Alice is just kind of watching, kind of bufuddled,

kind of curious this whole time. And then and then the mouse reaches down with a little scythe and it cuts some hair off from Alice's head, and it's about to prepare a fire to cook its food on top of Alice's head. And this is when Alice goes, now that's too far. Yeah, I mean she dunks in. Yeah, everything else was fine, hammering steaks into my head and all that's fine. But no, no, no, you're not starting a fire with my hair. Please? Now was this base?

Was this particular part from the book? It is, except it did not happen on top of her head. Basically, she was in the Ocean of Tears. She was lost, swimming swimming, and a creature swims by and she thinks, oh, it's quite large. It must be like a dog or a giant bear or something. And then she realizes it's a mouse, and she's like, oh, I must be very small.

Then the mouse guides her and this leads to the caucus race scene in the book, where it's basically the mouse explains what it's like to be a mouse, why it's trouble, etcetera, etcetera. But so so he skips some of that. But yeah, yeah, the mouse making an island and cooking on her head is not from from the book. Yeah, the steaks being your scalp boy, that was a real That was one of the many moments in the film

where I was yelping a little bit. Even though she's she's she takes it in stride, she's not in terror or anything. But I was like, uh, so, the the rabbits is now seen in this ocean after she has scared off the mouse. He's in a little rowboat, he's got some cakes with him, etcetera. If you've never read this story before, the whole book is her chasing this white rabbit. It is this mcguffin that she has chosen in her childlike mind that this is the goal. I

need to follow this white rabbit wherever it goes. I'm sure you all know that already. Um, But when she sees the rabbit. The rabbit accidentally just like rows its boat directly into her, and he drops a plate of these cakes again, these weird dark brown, sticky seed toothcakes. She eats one, she shrinks way down and then you know it's it's it's it just it just continues from there. Suddenly we are we are in a new scene. She's come up on the shore and she finally gets out

that door and gets to where she's going. Now the white rabbit, just like in the book, sees her and goes, hey, Mary Anne, because because the white rabbit has confused her for the servants, now that she has shrunk down to his his height. Uh now in the book, he goes, please get me my fan and gloves. But no, no, this is a much scarier adaptation. Go fed me a new pair of scissors because he lost his during the

the Ocean of Tears seen. So she does, and oh no, this this house, it's it's a bit like a house of blocks that that on on the exterior, very beautiful. Everything will be made of just things found around the house throughout this whole story. But um, inside the house are just weird skeleton monstrosities. Um like I guess these aren't really in the house. They're mostly around the exterior. But there are fish heads with big goggly taxes, dr

me eyes and little feet from another creature. There's like a taxidermied alligator with giant rodent skulls instead of alligator schools. These are all the um uh, if we're again, if we're looking to the books, these are the other servants that work for the White Rabbit. There's a bill, a handyman. There's a few others of some guinea pigs, etcetera, etcetera. Yeah, this is a fabulous, fabulous sequence where we basically get

a siege scene. Alice is inside the toy house and the White Rabbit and the various reanimated minions of the White Rabbit are trying to get inside, and there's a lot of wonderful, strange stuff that happens, like at one point, the white rabbits climbing up a ladder with a with a saw and acts like he's gonna I guess I'll saw her arm off, and she's like, no get away, and she's wats him down and he falls through a

plate of glass. It's just wonderful. Of course, Alice is changing in size perpetually throughout this scene as she is want to do so. So the siege continues, and Rabbit officially sends up a bill um. In the books, he is a lizard. In our adaptation, he is an alligator with a rodent skull, and to climb up the roof and go down the chimney. Alice shooes him away. He falls and gets hurt. And then this is just an odd little, you know, tableau that we see here. Can

you describe it? Rob Oh? Yeah? They so he gets the gator eat your bill here, gets his torso ripped open a bit, and of course sawdust comes out, spills out, and so the all the animals stop the siege. Mint for a minute. They stopped the siege, and they starts like trying to re stuff him, to revive him. At one point they have a uh, they have like a funnel in his mouth and they're pouring sawdust in it. You know, gotta gotta try and and resuscitate him here.

But it's a prolonged sequence. It also feels like semi religious because maybe it's sort of the way that the bill is laid across the white Rabbit's knee I think kind of like Mary holding the body of Christ after the crucifixion. Yeah, no, I I thought the same things. And yeah, it's it's very sweet and very strange the

whole time. But but I love a couple of little animation choices, like, for example, when Bill is stretched out being being fed the news sawdust and having his stomach stitched up, we see Bill's skeleton eyes blink several times, communicating to us the viewer, Oh, Bill's fine. This isn't like a grotesque stitching up of a dead creature. No, no, no, this is live. Bill is fine, and he's just being

helped by the White rabbits. Yeah. So many little little touches like that that add that little element of whimsy that keeps the sequence from straying too far into like the weird and potentially dark, keeping it within that realm of wonder. So Alice at this current moment is now in her shrunken doll state. She has escaped to the White Rabbit's house, and now she is running away from

this gang of skeleton monsters. Uh. In this pursuit, she falls into a vat of I'm gonna call it milk, but it's a milk like substance, whatever it may be. And immediately she regrows to her full human height, but oddly and amazingly, she has an incredibly creepy doll mask over her human face, which is just shocking to see. Yeah, you see her eyes, her her human eyes staring out of it. So it's this, it's like a costume doll

death mask. And then we get we get this scene where it what it what it falls down into the or they what they kind of intumbate within a closet, right, Yeah, because when she grows up into this doll creature whatever it is that she turned into, inexplicably she's fully paralyzed. So this skeleton gang has the opportunity to kind of um oh Guliver's travel style knock over. The giants tie her up and drag her, and they lock her in a closet. Why most of this is happening, I don't know,

but it makes sense. You see a monster, you lock it up in the closet. But then she emerges, she breaks out of this thing, and uh, and it's another great sequence because of course she's dressed inside the sarcophagus, She's dressed like the certain the doll on the outside of the sarcophagus. So it's it's really weird. It's so strange. Just yeah, it's like she was a cocoon and her exterior was her, but now she's inside of her, crawling out of her. It's beautifully done. Very strange. What one

one of the otter shots in this whole thing. Uh. So, now that she's locked in the closet, she looks around trying to figure out what she can do to to perhaps get out or just hey where am i? And she sees a lot of strange things. Uh. There are a bunch of look like chickens eggs, but when they hatch, these little eggs are are bringing forth exclusively skulls, and

they crawl around and chomp around a bit. It's beautiful. Uh. We see some of that nail bread and we can see some stop motion bread that she picks up, uh, like growing nails, which is beautiful. She'll open a can with a can opener and it'll be full of cockroaches. Oh yeah, it's full of giant cockroaches. That was as a bit much. Then there'll be a jar with a raw meats tongue just kind of flopping about the raw meats animation is some of the more grotesque in this thing.

And yet and yet it's it's not like attacking or threatening and just kind of doing its own going about its own business. So it's not as weird as the I think there's a crawling steak scene and Poultergeist, if memory serves right, Yeah, it's it's it's whimsical still, And ultimately she finds a sardine can, opens it up with exerdine can opener, and there's a key inside. Good, you know, So this is what she's been rooting around for. Apparently

she knew there was a key here somewhere. She's found it, and I love how she quite unnecessarily once she removes the key from the sardine can, it's dripping with oil or water probably I'm I'm assuming sardine oil is dripping from that key before she sticks it in the door to try it out, though, she licks it and she kind of makes a face like, look that tasted a little gross, and I was like, nobody told you to do that, Alice, why don't you the key? Very believable

child moment. Yeah, let's see so Alice then then exits the closet and just continues to search for this white rabbit. She's going from room to room trying to find things. She enters a room with these giant holes just board through the wooden floorboards, just peppering all over the floor, as if a rodent, you know, a giant rodent has

dug them out, or like like giant cartoonish termites. Yeah, but then we see socks burrowing and undulating through the holes as if they're like a sea serpent or worm, and it's it's wild. Yeah. I was a little afraid that we were going to see underneath those socks and there's gonna be some sort of hideous worm creature, but it's ultimately revealed. I guess that they're full of air or nothing at all, because there's a scene where she inflates a sock and then it crawls off like a worm.

It's true. I appreciates that, Um, a sock moving like a worm is as gross as it gets there. There is there is no extra skeleton inside or anything. And then this is actually one of my favorite moments because because I would say, this whole movie, you're basically just like waiting for like, oh, how are they going to do this scene like like like like what what what elements from just sitting around an old dilapidated house are

you going to cobble together to create this scene? And that this one, to me, I think is one of the more successful and one of the creepier. Uh so uh one of these socks, a pair of dentures and a couple of taxidermy eyes kind of cobble themselves together and they become the famous caterpillar from the Alice in Wonderland, and it sits on a darning block. I don't know

if most people knows what these are. Basically, if you're trying to fix a sock, you put like the sock over like these like wooden kind of like shape that way it's stretched out and you can like sew it's shut to to repair a sock. So yeah, it's it's kind of shaped like a mushroom. So the darning block kind of sits up like a mushroom and then the sock sits on top of it to be like, ah,

you know, hello, Alice, let's have our dialogue. I'm glad you explained this because I I had no idea what this object was other than oh, it looks like a wooden mushroom, and then of course it serves as the mushroom for this tableau for the caterpillar. But I had no idea that that's this is object had a practical real world application. Yeah, yes, yeah, if the listeners don't know what I'm talking about. Picture kind of like a door knob, but made of wood and looking like a mushroom. Yeah,

it's like a darning block for for sewing socks. So, as we know in the story next up, the caterpillar tells her that one side will make her grow larger, one side might could grow smaller. Now of the books and other adaptations, this is just a mushroom, so you can just pull us pull a little bit off. But no, no, no,

this is a piece of wood. So Alice gets out her her scissors and big loud chomp chomp on each side cuts off these little I guess uh, an exaggerated splinter, a hunk of wood, something around the sides of like a pencil, maybe smaller than that, like a golf pencil

worth of of, like a wooden splinter. So then that the caterpillar goes to sleep by sewing its eyes shut with a needle and thread, and then we continue Alice uh takes a couple of steps outside and she wants to test these mushroom bits a k a. Giant splinters of wood, so she takes a little bite of one, and this I think is one of the more beautiful adaptations of her growing and shrinking. What it does is instead of the character Alice getting large and small, which

we've seen many times. At this point, there are a bunch of trees sitting in like little Christmas tree stands outside, and when she takes a bite of one, we see them all shoot to the sky or shrink all the way down to saplings. And this is her doing a little trial and air to see which piece of mushroom makes her big and which which piece makes her small. And so there now she has a solution to this

our Our next scene is with the Duchess. Alice is walking and she sees a taxidermied fish and it's a there to deliver a letter, and as we find out, it's an invitation to a croquet game. So she goes to the that the fish, goes to the Duchess's door and delivers it to a taxi dermied frog This, to me is the one scary moment in this movie when that door slams open and we get our first like jump scared, look at the Texas dermaed frog. I don't know what it is, but it's just shocking, and I

think they intended it that way. Yeah, this is also this whole sequence also has a lot of um of baby crying in it, like that's the that's the soundscape that we have going on here, which of course fits the scene. It's not like it was just put in here to make us feel uneasy, but it did add to the uneasiness of the scene. I think, like, you can't have that much baby crying in your film and it not unnerved the viewer a bit. I mean, we're

just hardwired to feel on edge when you're presented with that. Now, especially and I will say that this is a moment when the book deviates from from what has been adapted here. Uh in the book versions. I'm sure most of you know, the Duchess is inside and she's dealing to this small baby. But the baby is getting like pepper in its face from the cook making some soup in the background. So

the baby is sneezing and crying and very upset. And then the cook just keeps throwing cutlery and plates and dishes and pots and pans at Alice, just to be like, get out of here, go away. So so we hear the din going on inside, all the shaking and plates and cutlery being thrown around. But when Alice opens the door to go inside, it's just the white rabbit and a baby. So, at least for me, this is kind of shocking because it's like, no, no, no, this is not how this story goes. Oh, I need to be

on my toes. This isn't really going to follow what I expect to happen. Uh. Now, so it's been the rabbit throwing the plates and cups and all those things, which, uh, you know, it's still scary. She runs away, she has the baby, and then the baby turns into a pig, just like from the book. Look that that the pig runs away. There we are, yeah, and thankfully the baby this the sound of a crying baby becomes predominantly the sound of a squealing pig, which is easier to take,

yes and cuter, I would say, yeah. Then uh we move on to probably the most famous scene from the story. Of Alice in Wonderland. The Mad Hatter scene at the mad Tea party. Uh, here's how they adapted it. Basically, there's a very creepy wooden marionette of the Mad Hatter, which is one of the more human elements we've seen in this story so far. And the march Hare is a very filthy wind up stuffed toy of a rabbit. So no, no, no, no taxed on me for this rabbit it is. It is a stuffed toy and of

course very dirty. Yeah. The scene is of course very mad, and all the things you'd expect happen in it. Um wow wow. So many times do they just kind of like go in this loop, starting with the march Hair putting butter in a watch and then he attaches the watch to the Mad Hatter. The Mad Hatter drinks tea. We see out the back that that that the t is just pouring down his empty hole and out the back of this of this marionette puppet, and then they

need clean cups. They moved down, repeat, repeat, repeat, It just goes and goes. Yeah, this sequence goes on for a while. This was for the most part, even though this film has again kind of a subdued pacing to it. It's not going to have it's his you know, art film pacing as opposed to modern child cinema pacing. But but for the most part, I feel like there's not a dull moment in the whole piece. There's always something interesting to look at. This one this one scene maybe

goes on a little too long for my taste. I could have maybe done with just like six pocket watches being buttered and not like eight pocket watches buttered. But it's still it's still excellent. I I don't I don't want to trash on it. Yeah, and I think it does a good job of kind of um, you know, in a very simple, subdued way, talking about you know how uh you know, the the repetition of actions and and and basically having this insanity be very practical and

then this storytelling. But yeah, no it works. But you're right, it is definitely repetitive on purpose. And we see a quick shot of the dormouse, but in this he is not a dormouse. He is a fox stole, or at least what I presume as a fox, some sort of like you know, the kind of wrap that a fancy person would wear made of fur. Um, it's not a drunk little sleepy mouse that's cute like like we see in the Disney animated version. It is a pealth of some kind that crawls around on the table and licks

out the teacups. Yeah. Um, moving on. Next, of course, Alice leaves this party. It's it's too mad for her. She is, she's not a fan of this. Uh. The white rabbit passes by and she chases after it, and this brings us to the croquet scene, another very famous scene. Now I love this because it's the most practical adaptation visually. All of the cards from this scene are cards. They are cut out, they are they are puppeted with like a little just like you know, little brads. They're all

two dimensional, very flat. It's it's it's it's a great adaptation with this. And of course, since um the Queen of hearts big order that she says when she's upset, off with their heads, they can actually come off because these are paper cards and Um, in the book, we never actually see anyone beheaded. It's like it's like understood that she always says, go behead these people, but they never actually kill anyone. She just forgets about it and

moves on with her life. We see the executioner, which is the White Rabbit, pull out these giant scissors that he's been hauling around this whole movie. That's that's his execution device. He cuts off the heads of these cards and they they are they are lifeless after the heads are gone. Yeah. Yeah, he snips a number of paper heads off and sometimes not paper heads, but he jumps in there and execute um. So we move on to,

of course, the famous actual croquet game. Uh the the the flamingos are start off as cards, of course, and the hedgehogs that are being hit around his balls are these little pin cushions, Like, oh, great, great choice. But then things are things are starting to turn wild. Things are starting to get a little weird as they do towards the end of a story. The flamingos have suddenly turned into real live chickens jumping around and are causing mayhem in what has been a a very no no,

only Alice is alive here reality. Suddenly we have live chickens, and then the pin cushions turned into real hedgehogs. Now they're crawling around and it's it's it's it's a little um surprising, a little baffling, but but but you go along with it. And then I love this part because it's just some very subtle commentary but very good. Uh. The White Rabbit then walks up to Alice and gives her a script, and it's like quick, now it's time

for the try. All let's go, and so Alice is supposed to learn her parts, uh for her participation in this trial. Now there's a seat maybe skipping head. But there's also a scene here where we see the mad Hatter in the march Hare again playing cards, right, and their their execution is ordered. White Rabbit jumps in cuts their heads off, but then their bodies are still alive, and they reach around and they find, of course the wrong head, and they put the wrong heat on top

of their body. So now we have the the march Hare's body with the mad Hatter's head and vice versa. And then they just continue playing cards, much like the logic of Bill being sewn up while blinking. It's it's like none, everybody's fine, you know. Uh. So the the trial happens, who stole the Queen's tarts? Alice is stubborn and doesn't want to go along with the script. She's trying to use logic on them and spell out nobody

is guilty. That the charts are right there, and of course these are the very ugly uh seed tooth brown gunky tarts that we've seen throughout this story. And uh, she wakes up just just like it goes. Alice wakes up, but she's still in her dingy, dirty old house. That part wasn't a dream, and um, some of the artifacts from her dream still remain here in this what we presume is a real real life for her. Um, the rabbit terrarium where the taxidermy white rabbit was is still broken,

and the white rabbit is still gone. The nails that he bit off with his rabbit teeth are still sitting there. Uh, the drawer still exists, and there's a pair of scissors in this drawer inside this terrarium, the rabbit scissors. So Alice picks up the scissors, and as a as a final line, we have Alice saying he's late as usual. I think I'll cut his head off, thought Alice to herself, And that's pretty much. Yeah, that's like credits. Yeah, and it really does set up that no, this is just

all in her mind. She is, she is every one of these creatures. And in fact, there's a visual moment to that, kind of a company's that that's very beautiful. When she's waking up from her dream, there's this moment where she's kind of thrashing her head back and forth, and her head transforms into each of the creatures briefly, you know, Queen of Hearts for a moment, Matt Hatter for a moment, White Rabbit for a moment right before

she wakes up, Just just quick visual cue. And then coupled with this line of I think I'll cut his head off something, the you know, the Queen of Hearts would say, we go, okay, this is just a very imaginative, imaginative girl, that this is the world she's creating. Are we still in that world? Because look, here's still a drawer inside a you know, a terrarium where a drawer would not fit. And again, this is not as dark as a nice it's really it's it's not played for darkness.

The music that plays at the very end is is actually more light and wins the cole really one of the few against a few touches of emotional manipulation by the music. But but even then, it doesn't feel like it's really augmenting the existing trajectory of the scene. It's it's there's nothing creepy about Alice saying, well, I'm gonna go cut that rabbit's head off now or what or whatever. You know, it's a it's presented with this kind of

you know, childlike imaginative wonder. I think now that we have wrapped up this story a really good elevator pitch since we've said it so many times, it's not as creepy as it seems. Yeah, but not uncreepy. Like if you like, if the idea of creepy stop motion animation appeals to you, you will love this film. There's a lot to love in it. But if if you're afraid of of creepy stop motion animation going too far, well this film will probably not be going too far for

you unless you have a very low threshold. Yeah, yeah, fully agree. It's uh and I I just find it wonderful. I I think it's very original, very easy to watch too, like like like it goes down easy for something that can be really ob to, something with no dialogue deliberate pacing, caustic sound design, and um, you know, all all the choices. Honestly, it's actually very watchable, very simple. It's it's still just

a great film. And I think you're right when you said perhaps because it has the blueprint of the original book to work from, we can kind of just like follow along much easier, you know. It's it's it's it's an easy narrative to follow. Yeah, it's. I think it's more watchable than than some sort of creepy stop motion works that I've seen, Like I think particularly there's some works, some work by Jerry Barta that I also quite like.

And it but and it's also sort of in the realm of like strange decrepit garbage comes around, it comes alive and starts crawling around all over the place, but is maybe a little less accessible. And you've got to definitely be on board for that sort of thing where this film is kind of meeting you halfway. Yeah, yeah,

I I give this two thumbs up. All right. Well, on that note, uh, look, I guess we're gonna go and close this episode out, but we'd love to hear from everyone out there if you have thoughts on Alice, if you have thoughts on other films of full length and short by John's Funkmeyer or any of the other stop motion artists that we mentioned in this episode right in, we would love to hear from you. Reminder that we're

primarily a science podcast. Here's stuff to blow your mind, but on Fridays we set aside most serious concerns and just talk about a weird film here on Weird House Cinema. I blog about the movies that we cover here on some new to music dot com and if you use letterbox that's l E T T E R B o x D dot com. We have a profile there it's weird House. We have all the movies we've covered listed there as well as sometimes there's a peak at what movies are to come in case you want to watch ahead.

And if anyone out there is missing Joe while he's on his paternity leave, I have a little treat for you. An episode that he and I recorded back before he went on his leave airs today literally today, the same the same day, this airs of my podcast Rusty Needles Record Club find out wherever you find podcasts and um if people have never heard my show before. Basically, it's a book club, but for music. Each episode is a different album. Me and my guest discussed that album. Uh,

Joe has been on a couple of times. We're hoping to get rob on soon in the future, and this one was Joe's pick, and he picked the self titled Black Sabbath album, their debut. So if you'd like to hear me and Joe discuss Black Sabbath's debut album, yeah, just go to wherever you get your podcasts, type in Rusty Needles Record Club. You'll see a cartoon dog as the logo. You'll know that's me and Yeah, listen to me and Joe talk some Black Sabbath. Alright, that that

is seasonally appropriate. Yes, So thanks for hosting, Seth, but also of course thanks Seth Nicholas Johnson for producing the show. And if anyone out there wants to get in touch with us, well just email us at contact at stuff to Blow your Mind dot com. Stuff to Blow Your Mind is production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts for My Heart Radio, visit the i Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.