Alice Through the Looking Glass (2016)

everything you have heard about this movie is true.

Best movie ever!

I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

The two Alice books are must-read classics, and have found their way onto screen in many different versions. James Bobin's film is a direct sequel to Tim Burton's Wonderland film: both take their names from Lewis Carroll's books, but neither takes any more than characters from them: Alice Through The Looking Glass is another original story.The end of Burton's Alice In Wonderland movie saw our heroine ditch her nerdy fiancée and go off to sea. Through the Looking Glass starts with a dramatic sea chase, before Absalom the Butterfly (voiced by Alan Rickman in his final cinema work) calls her back to Underland, where the Mad Hatter (now named as Tarrant Hightopp) is pining away for his lost family. Alice's adventure - seeking the Hightopp family - involves her stealing a time machine from Time himself, a menacing personification of entropy, who is understandably miffed at having this mechanism nicked, especially given that it has the potential to unravel reality.In short, the story has nothing whatsoever to do with Carroll's book. Having said that, it's not a bad story - it holds the attention, has lots of eventfulness and action, illuminates some of the characters, offers a couple of emotional moments, and allows Johnny Depp to mug from under the Hatter's elaborate makeup. I preferred it to the story offered in the previous film.The visuals are, as expected, impressive, and Sacha Baron Cohen's Time is a good addition to the cast. Rhys Ifans as the Hatter's Dad makes less impression. The reservations I had with the first film are still there - Barbara Windsor is just plain Wrong as the voice of the dormouse, naming the characters is both unnecessary and irritating, Anne Hathaway's White Queen's airy-fairy affectations get on your nerves, and Helena Bonfire Carter's Red Queen is still nicked wholesale from Queenie in Blackadder.Mia Wasikowska's Alice is pleasingly feisty, more so than she was in Wonderland. And so we come to Johnny Depp's Mad Hatter. We've seen the character before, of course, and Depp once more gives us the gentle, lisping, well-spoken and slightly barmy Hatter who has a bond with Alice, as well as the occasional psychopath from the Gorbals. To these he adds the declining depressive, a sad reflection of the heartier main iteration. But ultimately they are all Johnny Depp doing funny voices under funny makeups and, despite their appeal, I do find myself wondering if Depp has now overdone the heavily disguised eccentric phase of his career.This is nonetheless an enjoyable film, more so than its predecessor.

Just saw on Netflix, not even interested to watch it but put it up to entertain my young niece while i browse away on the phone. But from the quick glances, eventually it pulled me in by the stunning visuals, beautifully crafted and unique constumes, special effects are feast for the eyes and the oh so wonderful witty and melodious dialogue was captivating and heartfelt. I never read Lewis Carroll before, only watched the movies or Disney cartoons. This is wonderful movie and a joy to watch. Main cast was amazing especially Johnny Depp, Mia and surprisingly Sacha Baron Cohen whom I'm not actually a fan, but his character was so interesting. Love this. Such an underrated movie. Watching this again later with full attention.

Despite the special effects being sometimes great and other times 'meh', Alice Through the Looking Glass surprised me a lot! It's very funny, light and pleasant to watch. Once again we saw Anne Hathaway and Helena Bonham Carter carry the movie but Mia Wasikowska is a lot better than before.. her acting is really good in this one. The meanings about Time and Family are really well done in almost every possible way.. the 'cause and effect' is on point. Really good movie.

I enjoyed the first film, I thought it struck a good balance between the whimsical eccentricity of the source material and the modern Hollywood demand for thrill ride action. But the second time around they get it all wrong, much as they did on the second Pirates of the Caribbean. Too much rushing around and too little humour and quirkiness. Firstly, right from the get go, they forget to maintain the vital distinction between the Fantasy World of Wonderland, where the impossible is common place, and the Real World, where the possible needs to remain within the constraints of the culture and available technology of the day, in order to be credible. So we get Alice, the teenage female Captain, sailing her Victorian sail powered merchant ship in ways that defy the laws of Real World physics (Groan) Who needs to visit Wonderland if we can bend the Real World to our will in this way? Secondly I think the decision to try and explain the backstory and motivation of the previous film's characters and situations was misguided. We don't need to know this, and it goes against the whole idea of "Wonderland", once things are explained, they often lose much of their "Magic", their wonder. The Queen of Hearts happens to be a bitch and she serves a purpose in the story, that is her only "why", we aren't supposed to understand or feel sorry for her. The fun of Wonderland is in the novelty of the experience and trying to explain it only dilutes or destroys that. Thirdly they don't introduce enough new characters or situations with the requisite quirkiness, the original is a parade of quirky characters, this one only has a few, with the space between filled up with, briefly, revisiting old ones and, mainly, by pointless rushing about. I enjoyed Sacha Baron-Cohen's "Time", but his assistants were merely derivative of other movies tiny mechanical robots, and there was very little else we hadn't already seen in the first movie. Too whoever wrote the script for this one I say "Off with their heads!"