Alice has always been a favourite. Her journeys down the rabbit hole and through the looking glass were studiously read and reread as a child. Lewis Carroll would have been pleased. Having enjoyed them again by reading the books to my children, I was delighted to hear that Snake and the Corporal immediately chose Alice as first choice when invited to go to a movie recently with their grandparents.
But they went without me. If you did not read the blog about modern movie theatres, suffice to say that I did not want Snake and the Corporal to know that their gramps throws up when things move to fast on the screen. He has to wait for the DVD version or an opportunity to see it on a smaller screen. Gramma was delighted to take them. I just dropped the three of them off and picked them up afterwards.
They obviously enjoyed the film and the first question I asked was: “Who was your favourite character?
“I liked the rabbit. He was cool.” the Corporal responded.
“Oh,” I answered, “The white rabbit certainly plays an important role in the beginning of the story.”
“Not that rabbit,” Snake corrected me. “We really liked the other one.”
Racking my brains to figure out what other rabbit struck their fancy, I ventured: “Do you mean the March Hare?”
“Yah Gramps. He was funny,” the guys chimed in unison.
This did not seem to be an appropriate time to give the guys a learned discourse on the differences between a rabbit and a hare. After all, the species are closely related. “So what did you like about the March Hare?” I queried. “As I recall, he and the Mad Hatter ended up dunking the dormouse in a teapot.”
This confused them. “Well, no Gramps. They put Alice in the teapot.” the Corporal explained to his obviously addled grandfather. He went on to tell me about how they got Alice to the right size to do that.
This was all a bit disconcerting.
It was obvious that Tim Burton, whose version of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland they had seen, had taken liberties with Mr. Carroll’s story. I questioned the guys carefully and they assured me that the Red Queen and, my personal favourites, the protagonists Tweedledum and Tweedledee, had been retained in this telling. I did not have the nerve to ask if the Walrus and the Carpenter had been left out. They just might have been too erudite for Tim Burton’s liking.
Next time, I intend to take my Dramamine, take my chances and take the guys to the movie myself. It sounds like it might be necessary to protect my grandsons from those damn revisionists in Hollywood.
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