The movie itself only ranks a 6 on my movie scale having little to no plot to raise its ratings. It starts with a young Alice interupting her father's business meeting due to a nightmare. She continually has nightmares about falling down a huge hole, seeing a white rabbit, meeting strange creatures, and talking to a blue catapiller. The father listens attentively and then comforts her in very cute display of their loving and understanding father/daughter relationship.
I often find my mind wandering during such scenes, not out of boredom or lack of interest mind you. My mind wanders during these kinds of scenes because of the rarety of finding them in real life. In my mind there is almost nothing in the world as important or as special as a bond between father and daughter. It is from the dad that a girl recieves her strength and the picture of what she wants from a future husband. Yet these bonds grow looser and looser each generation and rarer and rarer to find. So my mind wanders to girls I know or even myself to some degree who would love to have what is playing on the screen infront of me.
After this we see Alice, now 19 years old, driving in a coach with her mother to a party that she apparently doesn't want to go to. The mother scorns her for not wearing a corsett or stockings and we find out that her father has since died and is very much missed by Alice.
Alice eventually ends up going down the rabbit hole and finds herself once again in Wonderland. There she finds the White Rabbit, the Doormouse and Tweedle-dee and Tweedle-dum awaiting her. They take her to Absolum (the Blue Catapiller) to ask him if she is indeed the "real Alice". They need the Alice who came to their world before because it was predicted in their calander that she would return once again to slay The Jabberwalkee and free the inhabitants from the Red Queen's tyranicle reign. When asked if she is the "real Alice" Absolum answers "Not hardly" and then vanishes.
To make a long story short Alice goes through many trials in order to rescue the Mad Hatter from the Red Queen, which she fails, and then make her way to the White Queen's castle. Once there she is again told that she must fight The Jabberwocky with the legendary Vorpal Sword which she retrieved from the Red Queen's castle.
Alice again meets Absolum who tells her that she is indeed the "real Alice" and that when asked about him denying she was the real Alice in the beginning he says, "I never said you were not Alice, I said you were harldy Alice. But you're much more Alice now."
Alice decides to be the White Queen's "Champion" and fight the Jabberwocky. She puts on the armour, takes up the Vorpal sword and goes to the battlefield. On the battlefield the Red Queen calls forth her champion, the Jabberwocky, and the White Queen calls forth hers, Alice.
Jabberwocky: So my old foe, we meet on the battlefield once again.
Alice Kingsley: We have never met.
Jabberwocky: Not you, insignificant bearer. My ancient enemy, the Vorpal one.
In the end Alice slays the Jabberwocky and returns to her own world where she finally stands up for herself and begins to make her own way in life.
Like I said, I only like this movie about a 6 but when I saw it for the second time a couple things stood out. 1. Alice tries the whole movie to live up to her name. She tries to live up to the name of Alice and prove that she is the real Alice. We as Christians do the same thing. As Christians we go through our whole lives trying to live up to a name as well. That name is Jesus Christ. As we start out we start as Alice did "not hardly" being like Christ. Then as time goes on and we go through trials, we gain back our "muchness" and grow closer to becoming like the one whose name we bare.
2. We also have a dragon to slay, or a job that only we can perform. When God made you he made you perfectly for the task he has assigned to you. No one else can do your job, you are God's champion. We all need to suit up in the Armour of God and slay the dragons in our own spiritual war. Like how only Alice could kill the Jabberwocky, there are dragons in your life that only you can slay.
3. The Vorpal Sword. In the movie the White Queen tells Alice that the Vorpal Sword knows what it wants to do and she need only to hold on to it. When I saw this I was reminded of the sword that we as Christians carry. The Word of God is our sword. The quote from the Jabberwocky is much like how I picture Satan talking to us when we go up to face him. The only difference is that he cannot call us insignificant ones. He might try, just to make us feel less worthy and to discourage us but in reality we are wholely and completely significant as the bearers of God's Word and just like the White Queen told Alice, we must simply hold fast to the Word of God and He will handle the rest.
I like the three things that stood out to you Melissa, and how you used them as analogies to what many people might find much more meaningful and interesting. If this was an essay, and I had the opportunity to score it, I would give it an A. Outstanding job!
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